


All You Need Is A Little Faith, Trust, And Pixie Dust

by Fox_155



Series: NosferaCT - A Symphony Of Chaos (NCT Vampire AU) [10]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: (not super explicit or extreme but it's there), Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Character Death, Fae & Fairies, Fluff and Angst, Genderqueer Character, Implied Sexual Content, Kidnapping, Markhyuck are fighting at first, Misgendering, Multi, Polyamory, Torture, as in they turn into a vampire, but it's unintentional most of the time, more character death and resurraction, non-consenting vampire-turning, probably more that I didn't think of now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-23
Updated: 2019-05-21
Packaged: 2019-11-28 12:40:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 11
Words: 54,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18208445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fox_155/pseuds/Fox_155
Summary: Jeno was just a normal university student, working a normal student job, normally dating his best friend with whom he had this very normal mutual crush on their other best friend (if this friend returned their feelings was yet to be determined), spending his normal holidays with the local vampire coven.Okay, maybe his life wasn’t that normal. And maybe Jeno would love to do something about Mark and Donghyuck’s continuing fight, that slowly split their quintet apart, but didn’t know how.But things started to spiral seriously out of control, when Jeno got kidnapped by anarchists planning to overthrow law and order as it was established in South Korea.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> PLEASE READ (i know it's long af)
> 
> I don't own any of the people and this story isn't by any means an accurate representation of the people by whom it is inspired by.
> 
> This is set in Seoul and Busan, South Korea, 2020, but with some creative freedom. I’m also not seeking to make this sci-fi, it’s just a time-line I’m following as this is a series, so we’ll just pretend no breaking new innovations have been made from where we are today (02/19)
> 
> This is part of a series (which I btw changed the name of) if you are interested in the other parts, check the series for the timeline. ^^ I try and make it understandable as a stand-alone, but this is the 10th part I’m writing, so I might miss something that seems like old news to me – I apologise in advance.
> 
> I’m also sorry that everyone in here will… suffer to some degree. But there’s fairies. Please mind the tags!!! If you think I’m missing anything, please let me know!
> 
> Also, I know I typically updates this series very quickly, however, I haven't finished this piece yet, so I won't be able to da that this time - sorry. BUT my first part, 4IMLN, broke 10,000 hits (wow, thank you so much!!) and I wanted to post this as a way to celebrate that.
> 
> Title is from Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie.

Jeno stared at the code in front of him and wondered, if Jaemin was blind or really, really stupid. Maybe both? 

“Nana. You never closed your command, that’s why this isn’t working.” Jeno drily explained and turned the screen so it faced his desperate boyfriend.

“What? No! No that can’t be I’m not a complete noob, I…”

Jeno pointed at the open bracket and started scrolling and Jaemin quieted, his face looking more horrified by the second.

“I am an idiot. Jeno, please do the honour of slapping me. For being a dumbass.” Jaemin turned towards him, face dead-serious. 

Jeno sighed and flicked his forehead carefully. The last time, he had fallen for this because slapping Jaemin sounded like a great idea, but Jaemin had moaned obscenely and groaned “Yes, daddy.”. Jeno still had nightmares about that.

Or wet dreams. Details.

Whatever, he didn’t need a repeat. 

“I think I’ll quit and just become a trophy husband or something. Do you know someone rich I could marry?” Jaemin lamented and saved the changes before closing the program and uploading his work to the university website. The deadline was at midnight and it was currently 11:51 pm. How Jaemin kept his life in line was beyond Jeno.

“Not really, no.” Jeno was definitely not rich, especially with college eating away the money, he had inherited from his parents after their deaths, faster than he could earn it back working like an upstanding citizen.

“Does Dongyoung still have any single friends left? They seem pretty stacked, I mean, they’re definitely living the high life and I’d also fit right in with all the queer people in that house.”

Jeno shook his head. He generally thought the idea of his boyfriend marrying rich was rather nice and might also end his indirect suffering from the irresponsible study morals he had, but Dongyoung’s friends… well, not a good option.

“Aw, bummer. Maybe I could just join Dongyoung and his boyfriends?”

“I don’t think they’re missing an annoying college student in their circle. And by extension, I’d kinda be in a relationship with Dongyoung then.” Jeno shuddered at the thought. It would be like dating your teacher. Or brother. Not here for that type of shit. That, plus… Jeno doubted Jaemin, being a human, was a good choice for… well, vampires. 

Of course, Jaemin didn’t know they were vampires, because he was possibly the densest person Jeno knew, and despite Donghyuck’s countless attempts at side-stepping the bewitchment put on him to keep the secret, Jaemin still was convinced the reason why Dongyoung and the other people he lived with called themselves a coven was because it was a safe space for LGBTQ+ people.

It probably was the safest space for queer people, yes.

But they were called a coven, because they were immortal, handsome predators of the night.

“I’m not annoying!” Jaemin whined and Jeno shook his head to himself. Self-awareness also wasn’t one of Jaemin’s strong points. But he was cute, loyal, and he loved him. So Jeno could oversee that. He could oversee a whole lot more in Jaemin, but that was old news. “Anyway, since I successfully avoided failing the class, how about we grab something to eat?”

“Nana… it’s midnight.”

“Yeah? I’m hungry.”

Jeno could probably go for some noodles… 

“You pay?”

“I… I pay?” Jaemin screeched. “I, a poor, suffering, broke college student, pay, while you, wealthy heir and working student, use me? I always knew you were only in it for the money.” 

Jeno waited for Jaemin to dramatically throw himself across Jeno’s bed, clutching his chest. 

“I am hurt!”

“Come on, Nana, we all know you sold the essay Dongyoung-Hyung helped you write for a hefty price to the desperate girl in your glass.”

“Well, maybe I did? But I worked hard on that before selling it. It’s rightfully earned money.”

“Money to spend to make your boyfriend happy then.” Jeno smirked “Thanks for the invitation, I’ll happily join you for a midnight snack.”

“Why? Why do you always manage to… urgh. Fine.”

 

Jeno returned to his dorm room well over an hour later, slightly tipsy from the Soju Jaemin had insisted they needed to drink along with their noodles. His roommate was already fast asleep in his bed, only a small Renjun-shaped hill under the blankets showing Jeno he was there.

He decided to postpone showering to the morning, though at 1:30 am there was probably no annoying queuing to consider, and fell into bed, immediately drifting off to sleep.

 

Overall, Jeno found college very… relaxing. He studied programming and all the subjects he had during the first year were ridiculously easy for him. Computers had always been Jeno’s interest. From 10-years-old, he had been writing simple homepages and taught himself beginers’ coding languages. Sure, there were other things, such as maths and economics, he had to take, but those also didn’t seem nearly as stressing as high school had ever been.

Part of his college experience being so nice and chill was, that people in college weren’t nearly as invested in their classmates’ lives as high school pupils. If Jeno didn’t appear during parties – no one cared. If Donghyuck spammed his Instagram account with equal rights slogans for LGBTQ+ people – there even were people supporting him. If Jaemin roamed around campus in his Barbie pyjamas – people threw him understanding smiles.

In high school, Jeno had constantly been busy trying to become one with his surroundings to avoid the taunting and mockery his classmates loved to torture him and his friends with. Now, he could just waltz down the hallways with his Pride Flag button on his hoodie and no one even cared enough to look up from their phone.

It was freeing. 

Because he was doing so well academically, he had gotten offered a job at a small start-up close to campus, who were smart enough to pick us first years no other company wanted yet, and train them to become future employees. All worries over never finding a job in the future, that had gotten put into his brain when he quit his training at the United Hunting Force Against Supernatural Attacks South Korea to become a killer of all things supernatural in the near future, were long gone.

After seeing one of the Hunters he considered his friend and a role model, Kim Dongyoung, get turned into a vampire and then… finding out he was still stiff, overthought, overworried, and nagged until your ears bled and had not once tried to rip out anyone’s throat – well, okay, he had, but only with fellow vampires – Jeno had completely changed his mind over the necessity of “freeing South Korea” from “their evil clutches”. 

He was sure his parents wouldn’t have wanted such a future for him, anyway. But after their deaths… it had seemed like such a logical choice, so easy, because that was how they made it seem. Jeno was glad to be out of there, like a member of a cult leaving and realising what kind of bullshit they had spewed.

 

Jeno peacefully played a shooter game on his phone the next afternoon, while Donghyuck next to him was ripping his hair out and colour-coding his notes 50 shades of neon. 

“Why aren’t you studying? It’s stressing my out that you aren’t studying.” Donghyuck looked up and fixed Jeno in a glare.

“No need. I only have one coding exam and one in maths. Piece of cake.”

“God, I fucking hate you!” Donghyuck muttered and scrawled something over his paper. “Why did I choose Pedagogics? Why is Pedagogics so hard? Why did no one warn me? I thought I’d get to play with kids and paint all day. Instead, I have to understand how the brain of a child develops. I didn’t sign up for this.” The tip of his pencil snapped under him putting too much pressure on it and Donghyuck cried out.

“You could have read the syllabus.” Jeno offered absentmindedly. It was the 86529th time Donghyuck complained over the lack of painting and stuffed toys in his field of studies. While other Pedagogics students got deeply offended when someone assumed that was what they were doing and fought to be taken seriously, Donghyuck probably ruined the effort of at least 20 students explaining their work wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows a day. Life sure was funny.

“Someone could have done that for me and told me.” Donghyuck huffed. 

Like Jeno, Donghyuck was an orphan, only he lost his parents at a younger age than him, and to a rogue vampire, rather than Seoul’s brutal traffic. He had been the first one to welcome Jeno at the orphanage the Hunter Union run, where he had ended up after his grandparents were deemed too old to take care of a teenager, becoming his first friend after having his old life ripped from his hands.

And just like Jeno, he had quit his training for the Union after finding out vampires weren’t actually blood thirsty monsters.

“Why didn’t you ask Ma…” Jeno cut himself off and glanced over the edge of his phone. Donghyuck pretended like he didn’t hear. “Why didn’t you ask Johnny? He knows stuff like that?”

“Because… I thought it would totally be playing games all day. Here, can you test me these fifteen questions?”

Jeno exited the game and took the paper from his friend. 

 

They got through them twice and Jeno thought Donghyuck hadn’t even done that badly, when Renjun came to their table, a bag of sugary treats in hand.

“Hey losers, I brought food because I feel like I’m slowly turning into a code of law.”

He flopped on the chair next to Jeno and threw the bag on the table. 

Where Donghyuck was his oldest friend, Renjun was his newest in this friend group. They had attended the same dancing class in first year of high school and became friends over the common ground of all being male. Renjun had gone to a different high school, one that taught the Chinese curriculum, so they’d probably had never met otherwise. 

Jeno was sure, Renjun would make the cutest code of law ever seen.

“Renjun, you’re heaven sent, I love you and I will do anything if you share.” Donghyuck whined and started going through the treats. 

“Yeah, well, I know. Pick whatever you want.” Renjun waved his hand and Donghyuck wailed in happiness, before ripping open the gummi bears. 

“So, how’s the studying?” Renjun asked Jeno, while Donghyuck was stuffing his face.

“Well, I think?”

“You’re still not doing anything? Jaemin stayed behind in the library voluntarily, because he said the math questions were so hard.”

“I guess they’re a bit tricky, but nothing too bad.” 

“If I didn’t know you, I’d immediately hate you and your arrogant ass.” Renjun laughed and ripped open some sugar-coated Mango. Renjun didn’t like sweets per se, but he loved sugar and fruits. It was kind of cute. Like everything about him!

“Thanks.” Jeno sniffed, knowing not to take offense, and took some gummies from Donghyuck. 

“Well, I do still hate Jeno and his ass, though it’s a pretty nice ass. It’s just not fair. Tell me you’re suffering, too, Injunie, I need someone to be on my side.” Jeno glanced over quickly to see if Renjun agreed that he had a nice ass. Were Jaemin here, he would have agreed.

Well, then again, Jaemin was his boyfriend and Renjun his untouchable, beautiful, way-out-of-his-league-crush he shared with said boyfriend. At least he wasn’t suffering alone but could vent together with Jaemin over how beautiful and ethereal Renjun had been today and how beautifully he used words to bring others to tears of fear.

“I am suffering.” Renjun groaned, unfortunately leaving Jeno’s backside unmentioned. “I think I’ll just spend the entire break with Kun and have him explain all the court orders we’ll be talking about next semester, I don’t think I’ll survive another year otherwise. I didn’t know law was this hard…”

“At least you have Kun. Who’ll explain this to me? No one in that damn coven ever thought ‘Hey, let’s become a kindergarten teacher’?”

“If I lived eternal life, I’d permanently stay as far away from children as possible. Not to mention, they climb all over you and then they’d ask questions like ‘why don’t you have a heartbeat’. Seems inconvenient, if you ask me.” Renjun decided. The Mango was empty now and he continued on with Strawberries.

Jeno decided to send Jaemin a quick text, asking if he’d be alright or if he needed something. 

Jaemin requested the ‘sweet embrace of death’, but Jeno didn’t want to go to prison.

 

Technically speaking, Jaemin lived on the 4th floor of building R, room 402, which was a single (yes, but he was oh-so-broke), the bathroom shared with the two dudes next room. They were pretty funny. One of them, Felix, had even gifted Jeno a cake for his birthday after walking in on Jaemin pinning him against the sink, tongue down his throat. That had been during the very confusing phase of “Am I really in love with my friend?” during the beginning of the first year last March and April. 

So they were cool, and not homophobic, which was already enough to get into Jeno’s good books.

However, Jaemin invaded Renjun and Jeno’s double on a daily basis. 

Especially when Jaemin was stressed, he needed attention. A lot of attention.

“You’re like Tinker Bell, she also dies when she is neglected.” Renjun muttered from behind the thick corpus juris he worked through his mock questions with.

“I think I am!” Jaemin nodded “But I think you look a lot more like a fairy than I do!” he smoothly complimented.

Renjun ripped something and jerked to look up at the two boys on Jeno’s bed. “I don’t… I don’t look like a fairy! Why should I look like a fairy? That is absurd.”

“Well, I don’t think they actually exist, but if I go by my own imagination, then yes, you do look like one! Small and pretty!” Jaemin beamed. 

Renjun looked at Jeno for help.

“Well, I have to agree.” Jeno unhelpfully supplied. Renjun made a panicked whining noise and hid behind his book.

“I have to study! Why are you annoying me? You literally have your boyfriend right next to you to bother.”

Jaemin turned to Jeno now.

“Aw Jeno-ya, can you please write my math exam for me? I’m going to fail! And there’s no one around to marry me as their trophy husband!”

Jaemin forcefully cuddled against Jeno, wrapping all four limbs around him. Jeno gently patted his back. Jaemin’s heart was beating against his chest, and he knew Jaemin would feel the same in return.

“You should study if you thin-umph.” Jeno’s wise words were cut off by a mouth on his. He grinned and opened his lips for Jaemin to lick into his mouth, which he didn’t wait another second to do. 

Some things you did over and over became boring, but kissing Jaemin never got boring to Jeno, the warm and slick movement of tongues against each other different and exciting anew every time. Jeno grabbed Jaemin’s hips and pulled them closer so they were pressing against his and he could grind…

“You animals, I’m still here!” Renjun screeched and something hit Jeno’s shoulder – a bunched up page of paper.

“You can join, if you want.” Jaemin chirped. 

“You can see your sorry asses out of this room if you keep this up!”

“But Jeno has a very nice ass.”

“Stop bringing that up!”

 

Jeno found himself faring pretty well with his strategy of not studying. The first exam seemed easy enough to not give him any reason to study for the second. Instead, he put in a few extra hours at work to save up more money, putting the free time had got from not having classes anymore to good use.

It was the middle of January now. Once they were free for school, it would be almost the Lunar New Year. Most people were going to spend it with their families. Seeing how Jeno didn’t have one, he’d just stay on campus with Donghyuck and wait for the holidays to pass and the new semester start in late February. 

They could visit Kun and the coven, that’d be fun. 

The years before, Donghyuck had been invited to the Lees for New Year but… Mark and Donghyuck had sort of been fighting. Which itself was just wrong. Sure, they were fighting daily most of the time, but it was usually petty arguments over meaningless things.

No one knew for sure why Mark and Donghyuck weren’t talking and Jeno wasn’t nosy enough to force the information from anyone. But he was sure it had to do with Donghyuck’s long term crush on him and Mark getting a girlfriend. But it had been over a month and it was slowly breaking Jeno’s heart. And it was sort of breaking their friendship-circle, too. 

Of course, things from high school weren’t meant to last forever. But… Jeno was still feeling regretful over the split. If it came to it, he’d stick with Donghyuck, but it felt like that meant losing Mark right now and Jeno also didn’t want that.

 

But before the New Year, the four of them planned a small vacation. They had done the same thing last year, after becoming adults officially. Well, with Mark, but that was out of the question now. No one had gotten arrested, so it seemed like a good enough reason to do it again. They had been to Jeju last year, where Donghyuck’s family had lived. This time, they were headed for Busan. 

Jeno could use that extra money well. 

He was one of the last people still at the office, fixing a few glitches in a customer’s program. 

“Jeno, can you lock down when you leave?” 

He looked up from his screens and saw his co-worker Yeeun, that he shared the office with, all packed up and ready to leave. 

“Yeah, sure.” Jeno nodded. 

“Remember to lock the windows, okay?”

“Will do.”

“Thanks, good luck with that.”

“Thank you, bye.”

“Bye bye.”

Her heels clacked down the floor and Jeno re-emerged in the code.

By the time he had sorted out all the problems, it was well past ten and the floor was silent. Jeno saved all his open documents and files, before starting to shut down his computer. There was an unread email in his outlook from an unknown user.

Jeno frowned. That should have gotten sorted into spam! He only ever communicated with the other employees, if there was customers or other outsiders, they’d be talking to the accounting and the help desk.

He opened the mail warily.

It was directed at him!

“Dear Lee Jeno,

It has been brought to our attention that you left the rats at the Hunting Union. Good choice. But we know you have insider information. To successfully overthrow them, we need anything we can get. Please reply to this email to make an appointment to inform us and our legion about everything you know.

Kind Regards, Mr V”

Jeno stared at the text with wide eyes. A chill ran down his spine, this was so weird and unprofessional, yet oddly specific and on point…

He marked the email as Spam so it’d get forwarded to the security department, but the moment he clicked the button, the whole conversation disappeared. He frowned and checked the deleted messages, but it was gone.

He opened the firewall protocol to check for a security breach. The only answer to how this got into his emails in the first place and then disappeared before he could alert anyone, was that someone had hacked into the systems.

Jeno felt his heartbeat start to accelerate in his chest, as he read over the output of the security system, but there was nothing off, at least nothing he could find. The feeling of being watched started to creep up on him, despite the email being on the computer and whoever had sent it possibly sitting across the globe. But knowing they already had this much personal information about him made him uneasy.

Never mind their plans to overthrow the union, that was just dumb. But Jeno didn’t appreciate his personal data getting sneaked into.

He searched through his computer system for the deleted email, but it had simply vanished. Without even a trace, he couldn’t report this to anyone. Not to mention he couldn’t bring up the Hunting Union if this wasn’t about life and death – which it luckily wasn’t. 

Adrenaline still pumping in his system, Jeno decided to just close everything down. Maybe it had just been a weird error in the computer system? Maybe it had been accidentally sent?

The screens turned pitch black and with the sound of his computer’s ventilation off, the floor was spookily quiet. Jeno pulled out his keys and quickly locked the windows, before picking up his jacked and shawl. He switched the lights off and locked the door as well, before turning to head down the hallway. 

But the feeling that someone was watching him didn’t leave. He checked over his shoulder three times, but of course there was no one there. It had been nothing but a virtual interaction, one he shouldn’t read too much into on top, but it felt like someone had been there in person, because they were able to hack into very private information.

His employee chip card beeped against the reader and he pushed through the large glass doors into the staircase. 

Every step echoed loudly from the stone walls and Jeno pulled out his phone. His fingers were shaking a little, as he tapped on Jaemin’s contact information.

It took seconds for the line to connect, Jeno hadn’t even made it down another flight of stairs.

“Jenoooo!”

“Hey Nana.” The feeling of fear had dropped off him the moment he heard his boyfriend speak, heart finally slowing down in his chest and he could breathe properly again.

“Are you finally done? I was lonely! Renjun kicked me out when I started braiding his hair. Can you come over?”

“Didn’t you want to study for the coding exam?” Jeno sighed. 

“I did. I decided I was going to wing it. But Injunie wants to get a perfect grade. What a nerd. The cutest nerd, of course. Anyway, I’m bored and kind of horny.” 

“Of course you are.” He chuckled, as Jaemin made puppy noises over the line. “I’ll be there in ten.”

“Great! I love you!”

“Love you, too.” Jeno shook his head as the connection broke off. He left the tall building and crossed the still busy street, the fence around the campus starting on the other side of the road. Really, it was just an email. No reason to freak out! 

 

“Hey babe.” Jaemin was draped over the doorframe in a way that was probably supposed to be sexy, however, the completely rumpled t-shirt with a faded Pokémon print combined with boxer short that had seen better days ruined the impression for the biggest part. 

Jeno laughed and leaned in for a kiss anyway “Were you waiting?”

“I was. But you were being a sexy IT guy, so I didn’t want to disturb my hard-working boyfriend.” Jaemin purred and hooked his fingers into the loops of Jeno’s belt, dragging him inside, the door closing behind them.

Dorm management was extremely fussy about male and female inhabitants having no place to get it on.

But caught up in heteronormativity, they hadn’t remembered to consider the same-sex relationships. Not that Jeno would tip them off…

 

The next day marked the final day of exams for Jeno and Jaemin. So, of course, they celebrated that with an overdose of chocolate parfaits from the Café on campus right after.

“I think I probably got just enough points to pass the class. God, I hate coding.” Jaemin sighed deeply. 

“Nana… why are you studying IT then?” Jeno raised his eyebrows at his boyfriend. 

“Because you do it, duh. Maybe I should switch to law, though…”

“I really don’t think that’ll make your life easier, look at Injunie, slaving away behind his books.”

“I know. But he looks so cute and smart doing so.” Jaemin smiled dreamily.

“That’s true. But maybe you should have chosen something that aligns with your personal interests more? I don’t know…”

“Yeah, but that resulted in the recommendation to become an idol singer and really, I don’t want to live a life without being able to date anyone.” Jaemin shook his head in bewilderment. “I have too much love to give! And there’s too many cute and hot people on this planet!” He nudged Jeno’s ankle under the table and he knew he was smiling dumbly over the Jaemin’s words. 

“I’m sure idols date in private.”

“Well, I don’t want to date in private. I want to tell everyone how you’re literally the best.”

“Stop being so cheesy, oh my god.” Jeno groaned, but knew his cheeks were a soft pink from embarrassment and happiness. 

“Oh, speaking of love, there’s Mark over there. Are we still allowed to talk to him?”

“Of course, Donghyuck’s not five.” Jeno turned and spotted the Canadian holding a tray on which his girlfriend carefully placed a piece of cheesecake. 

“Great! I haven’t even heard how his exams were. After Renjun having that concussion after New Year, Mark never was around anymore.” Jaemin complained. Jeno nodded in silent understanding.

That had been a shocking day. Taeil, Renjun’s childhood replacement-bigger-brother and also relatively new vampire member of Kun’s coven, had called them to ask if one of them could please bring Renjun’s insurance card to the hospital, because he had suffered a concussion and had to stay overnight for observation.

Luckily, he hadn’t suffered any actual long-term damage. However, Jeno and Jaemin had left Mark’s flat, where they had knocked out at 5am after a hard party the night before, without saying goodbye and thank you properly. After, Mark had never been around anymore. Part of the problem of Mark and Donghyuck apparently now being unable to breathe the same air. It had been over three weeks since.

“Yo! Mark Lee!” Jaemin waved and Mark looked their direction from where he had just been paying for the food and drinks. His girlfriend Mina latched onto his arm and pouted, but Mark happily came their direction.

“Hey, long time no see!” He placed the tray on the table “You doing well?”

“Yes, especially since our final exam was today.” Jaemin happily announced.

“How about you two?” Jeno asked, before his boyfriend could make any side comment towards Mark or Mina. 

Jeno had grown up with Mark and Donghyuck. Jaemin had gone to school with only Donghyuck. Sure, Mark was like an extension of Donghyuck (or used to be), but Jaemin’s loyalty towards Donghyuck came with a fierce protectiveness and a sense of anybody causing him even the mildest discomfort being evil. And if that was another friend that didn’t mean as much to Jaemin as Donghyuck did, he wouldn’t let that stop him from telling that person exactly how dumb their behaviour was.

He had already made a hand full of snarky remarks towards Mina for Jeno to be sure the girl already low-key hated him. No need to fuel the fire.

“Oh, you know… it’s all normal.” Mark shrugged.

“Well, Mark of course breezes through everything, because he’s a smart cookie!” Mina smiled and carefully took some off the cheesecake and held it Mark’s direction. The other stared at the fork in confusion for a moment, like he had no idea what she was doing. He maybe actually hadn’t. Mark was trying extremely hard to be a good boyfriend, but he was about as romantic as Renjun was buff – which was not at all. 

Were this Donghyuck, he would have long shoved the cake into Mark’s mouth and loudly complained. But it wasn’t. Donghyuck was nowhere to be seen, leaving a big hole behind.

Jaemin leaned forward and took the cake off the fork.

Jeno kicked him under the table, but Jaemin didn’t even wince. He also didn’t smile at Mina, how he would have were this literally any other person, making it fun and flirty. She glared back at him.

“Great!” Jeno tried to ignore the sour look on Mina’s face. “So, are you going to spend Lunar New Year together?”

“Yeah, I guess.” Mark nodded. Mina smiled stiffly and started eating the cake herself.

“It’s a bit of a tight schedule, because we’ll be celebrating with only my close family, then my extended family and grandparents, then, of course, Mark’s parent and brother, and then we’ll also visit his grandparents. Plus getting blessings from a temple, that one’s a given. But we have it all worked out, right, honey?” 

“Yeah, sure. I mean, my mom would have made the regular lunch for the New Year’s Day, but since Mina’s family will go out to eat I’ll miss it this year. It’d probably be weird anyway… without Hyuck.” Mark rubbed the back of his head, sadness in his eyes. 

“Well, you should spend the days with your family, you can meet friends after.” Mina cut in, jealousy clear in her voice. Jeno wished he had asked about how difficult exactly economics II had been, rather than opening Pandora’s box.

But it was too late. “Hyuck’s like family.” Mark argued.

“Well if he were, he wouldn’t be making such a fuzz over us dating. It’s only normal! He should get a girlfriend, too, maybe he could stop taking up all of your time then.” Mina huffed. Jeno almost laughed, if the mood wasn’t definitely unfitted for laughing, because Donghyuck was as straight as a u-turn and had been announcing that on his Instagram ever since coming to the realisation thanks to Kun’s coven. Mainly Ten, who had been their dance instructor way back when, casually announcing he was in a relationship with another man.

It had been an eye-opening experience for all of them, Jeno believed.

Then again, she probably didn’t follow Donghyuck’s Instagram, her sworn enemy over Mark’s affection.

“He doesn’t take any of my time now.” Mark lamented. The ‘I wish he did’ unspoken but clear.

“Yeah, well, great friend.”

Mark didn’t reply anymore, but sipped his coffee wordlessly, clearly pissed off.

Jeno eyed Jaemin carefully, feeling like he was interrupting something he shouldn’t. But Jaemin was munching chocolate croissant without a care in the world. When he noticed him looking, he broke off a piece and held it towards Jeno, who easily opened and let his boyfriend feed him.

Jeno felt Mina’s stare on his face, but decided to ignore it. There was nothing good that could come out of this after Mark had just not accepted her offer, though not with bad intentions. 

 

“Do you think Mark’s actually happy? She’s so annoying.” Jaemin muttered. The lock on his dorm room beeped and he pushed the door open.

“It’s not our business.” Jeno tried. He couldn’t deny he was a little curious, too, but… it really wasn’t his relationship, so he wasn’t entitled to messing where no one had asked him to mess. 

“Still. I can’t believe he bears with her. Hyuckie and him always enjoyed New Year’s day at the Lees the most, when they all had a huge feast in nothing but their pyjamas. I can’t believe she makes him miss that.”

“Well, I’m sure whatever her family does is important to her, too. They’re finding common ground.” Jeno took Jaemin’s hand and dragged him to the bed. “Now, can we stop talking about other people? I’d much rather talk about you!”

“Of course, I love talking about myself!” Jaemin chirped and shamelessly placed himself right on Jeno’s lap. “What do you want to know? My favourite colour? Animal? Sex toy?”

“You really are in no place to call other peoples’ girlfriends annoying, when you’re like this.” Jeno giggled and pulled Jaemin down into a kiss.

 

Jeno was on the bed, still flying on the aftereffect of his orgasm. It was late and he was tired, but he knew he’d have to shower. He pulled out his phone to check his Instagram, however, an unread email blinked up on the lock screen.

Sent at 10:01 pm from an unknown user. Jeno felt his blood run cold. This had to be a joke!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me: I’m going to finally explore some new ships for the Dreamies. Let’s see…  
> Brain: Write Norenmin and Markhyuck.  
> Me: But why? I’ve done that over and over, other pairings are so cute, too…  
> Brain: You’ve gotta.  
> Me: Well, this compelling argument won me over!
> 
> (I swear I had something else in mind. But… well. Now we have the 29348th story with these ships. I love them. Please love them, too.)
> 
> And I’m sure Mina is a sweetie, I saw her on PD101 and during her MC gigs with Mark, sorry for making her a bit annoying.
> 
>  
> 
> [CuriousCat](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I planned to update tomorrow, so this is early, but still pretty late for my standards. I got so caught up in my other story (Moon Diamond), so I ended up not writing a single thing in this one for two weeks - sorry, but it might happen again idk...
> 
> Thanks for the response the first chapter got, I'm really happy to hear people were waiting for this, I hope you'll enjoy it >.<

“Dear Lee Jeno,

We see you decided to ignore our first invitation. Maybe we haven’t made our case clear enough. We are the VX fighters for justice. We will eradicate the United Hunting Force Against Supernatural Attacks South Korea and take over the rule in their stead. 

As an enemy of theirs, you should work together with us, doing your part in getting rid of the human scum. After all, you wouldn’t want to be on the wrong side?

Best regards, Mr V”

 

Jeno stared at the words. That was a threat if he had ever seen one. Not be on the wrong side… 

Then again, it was megalomaniacal to plan on taking out the whole Union. There were thousands of members scattered over South Korea, backed up by the police and government, which was ultimately connected to the army and the Hunting Unions of all the members of the International Union.

You couldn’t just kill off a few people and call it a day.

Jeno still wanted to take a screenshot. Maybe show it to Johnny. He was a few years older than him and was still working for the Union despite dating a vampire. Not in the active field, but still. He may have heard of where this came from.

However, the moment the screen flashed in confirmation the shot had been taken, the message was gone, leaving a white screen. 

Jeno scrambled to sit up, staring at the phone. He pulled up the screenshot, but it was blank. His email box looked how he had left it days ago, no message from an unknown user anywhere. He checked the deleted mails, and the junk mail. But it was gone, like it had never existed. Exactly like yesterday.

Someone had seemed to grand themselves remote access to his private phone, too. Jeno contemplated the words. But it sounded much too ridiculous for him to take seriously. The invasion of his privacy, however, made him shudder in cold blood. 

He’d have to read up on how to restore that and get them kicked from his phone. He had texts with his friends that were private. And with Jaemin! Those were even more private! He didn’t want anyone else to snoop in there.

“Hey, the shower’s free.” Jaemin chirped and Jeno decided to figure this out later. A few minutes wouldn’t make a difference now.

There was no way someone could overthrow the Union. You’d need to pull up a full-blown revolution and collapse the government to do so. 

“Thanks.” he smiled up at Jaemin and slowly crawled off the bed. In the light of the lamp and with his boyfriend close, it was easy to push past irrational fear. 

 

There was another message the next day, that disappeared without trace when Jeno tried to forward it. The initial nervousness and fear were gone, though. It was a little worrying, however, the hacker didn’t seem to be interested in his private life beyond the fact that he had trained for the union in the past. Jeno’s true concern was how to restore the privacy of his phone, as his initial attempt seemed to have been futile. 

He put down his phone on his bed side table with a sigh. Renjun was in the shower, leaving him alone in the room. He should pack. They’d be leaving tomorrow at 6 am to get the train to Busan. But instead, he searched the Apple forum for information on hacked phones.

 

By the time Renjun returned from the communal shower, Jeno had already re-set everything other users had had success with and started throwing random clothing into a bag.

 

“I’m tired!” Donghyuck whined, clinging to Jeno like deadweight. 

“You can go back to sleep in literally ten minutes.” Renjun shook his head.

“But I’m tired now. And it’s cold.”

“Come here, I’ll cuddle you!” Jaemin offered. “That’ll warm you up!”

“Yes!” Donghyuck purred and let himself be pulled close. Jeno checked their ticket to see if they were at the right part of the track. Renjun side-eyed him.

“Are you okay?” Jeno asked softly. 

“Hm… are you?”

“Me? Of course, I am!” Jeno blinked in confusion.

“Hm. Just asking. Because your boyfriend is running wild.” Renjun nodded towards Jaemin, who was massaging Donghyuck’s scalp now.

“How?”

“Well… uh… do you really not care?” Renjun whispered, brows furrowed.

“About Nana being touchy with Hyuck? No, of course not.”

“Well, shouldn’t you be, I don’t know, jealous?”

“Oh no, the only one sometimes getting jealous is Nana. He needs a ton of attention.”

“Okay, whatever you say.” Renjun shrugged. Jeno wondered, if maybe they should drop very subtly that their relationship wasn’t limited to two people. Because… it seemed like Renjun was under that impression. Which… why? Jaemin was constantly flirting with him. Jeno would be, too, if his flirting were better. As it was, he tried his best.

It was slightly offensive how those efforts seemed to have gone unnoticed.

The train pulled into the station and Jeno started herding everyone inside. They had four seats facing each other with a table in the middle. Renjun immediately set up his laptop and opened Netflix, clicking on Train To Busan, getting ready to hit start the moment the train left the station. 

Donghyuck had taken the pillow he brought everywhere and placed it against the window, curling up on his seat comfortably. The pillow had a big full son on it and been a gift from Mark. Of course. And one of the few things that Donghyuck hadn’t banned from using after their fight.

Jeno planned to nap as well, because 6 was just too early to be up, but Jaemin shook him.

“You can’t sleep! Train to Busan is scary! I need you to cuddle!” he whined into Jeno’s ear. So, Jeno stayed up, being woken every time he almost slipped back into dreaming. The only true perk was Jaemin pressing into him and watching Renjun follow the film’s plot in deep concentration. Donghyuck snored loudly during a dramatic moment, but other than that, it was a peaceful trip.

 

Jeno got a text from Mark, asking him if they weren’t already on their way to Busan while Jaemin tried to read the map on how to find the guest house they were staying at. He replied they had already arrived. It was odd that Mark didn’t know their exact position, everyone’s mood, and the weather from Donghyuck keeping him up to date. But it was what it was. 

“This way.” Jaemin announced and their group started moving that way.

It turned out to be the wrong way and it took them 2 hours, the help of Naver Maps, and Renjun scolding Jaemin to come off his high horse to actually get to their destination. But at least they had found it and didn’t have to sleep under a bridge. 

Busan sort of was known for high gang activities, because there were hardly any super naturals in the city to keep the illegal scene in check by being even more illegal and dangerous. So, sleeping outside might be a bit of an unwise choice. 

He informed a concerned Dongyoung they were fine, nothing had been stolen, and no one gotten hurt yet, but that meant he missed the allocation of the beds. When he looked up from his phone, Renjun and Donghyuck were sitting on the top bunks. 

“I want to make something extremely clear right now.” Donghyuck hollered, crossing his arms. “This is a gross-couples free zone. If Renjun and I have to be single, you don’t get to be lovey-dovey. No kissing, no making out, cuddles are allowed, because we all can get them.”

“So, blowjobs in the shower are fine then?” Jaemin batted his eyelashes. 

“No!” Donghyuck screeched. “Why would you say something like that?”

Jeno glanced at Renjun and saw a faint blush dusted over his cheeks. Cute.

“You can have one, too, if that’s the criteria.” Jaemin offered and poked his tongue out to make some suggestive licking motions. Jeno tried to mask his laughter with a cough.

“I do not want it!”

“So, are we going to see the ocean? The landscape? Or just arguing all day?” Jeno asked, still trying to supress laughter, only to free Renjun from his obvious misery of blushing darker and darker. Really, how could he not get they weren’t completely exclusive?

“The beach! We have to see the beach! I asked Yuta for tips and he recommended a ton, but I don’t want to get lost in the woods. So. Beach!” Renjun announced, hopping off the bed gracefully, not even making a sound as he touched the floor.

 

January was not really the perfect month to visit any bodies of water. 

The wind cutting into Haeundae Beach was biting and Jeno ducked deeper behind his scarf to keep warm. 

However, there was no denying the ocean stretching on in front of them until the horizon was stunning. 

Donghyuck loudly slurped the fish cake soup he had picked up. 

“I think Yuta didn’t remember we have normal body temperature.” Renjun said, teeth chattering. 

“Here, let me warm you.” Jaemin chirped, followed by a pained grunt a moment later. 

“Sorry, we should move on, it was just so beautiful, I got a bit lost.” Jeno sheepishly offered.

“It’s fine. We all know you’re secretly the most romantic in this group.” Donghyuck assured him.

 

They moved from the beach, and when the wind got blocked by houses and didn’t sting on their skin like needles anymore it didn’t even feel that freezing anymore. 

From there, they arrived at Haedong Yonggung Temple quickly. Without tourists competing to see the beautiful view around, they were able to snap some stunning pictures, both with and without themselves in it in different line-ups.

By the time the sun had disappeared, leaving the city glow in lights similar, yet different from Seoul’s night sky, they were all thoroughly frozen.

The Barbecue place they found was warm and thickly smelled of grilled beef. As the four settled around a table, Jeno felt the warm comfort of being with people he knew he could trust and that trusted him in return. He had worried that Mark’s absence would be a lot more awkward and obvious. But it wasn’t that noticeable. 

Maybe it was for the better. If Donghyuck and him actually didn’t make up, he’d have to get used to this. And the easier it was, the better. Jeno was sort of okay at how to let people go – a necessity he had learnt in his early teens, after his parents’ deaths. 

But letting Mark go was still something different than letting some friend he had been on the volleyball team with go. The less he thought about it, the less it’d hopefully hurt.

Jaemin, being the youngest, was made to grill despite massive protests from his side over being born in 2000, too. 

“I think we shouldn’t go to the fish market tomorrow. We have two days, why not sleep a little tomorrow and go the day after?” Renjun suggested.

“It was your choice not to sleep but watch that film on the train.” Donghyuck teased.

“Like you’d be the first one to jump out of bed tomorrow.” Jeno shot back. Really, Donghyuck was the worst of them all, to think he’d even try and paint himself in a different light – unbelievable. 

“I could be?” Donghyuck snorted, but no one believed him. Jaemin started cutting the pork belly and Jeno helped himself to a lettuce leaf, getting into position to shove as much meat down his throat in the least amount of time possible – because there were three other guys with the same plan.

“I think this is good, right?” Jaemin muttered, poking the meat with the tongs.

“It certainly looks good. Okay, dig in boys!” Donghyuck opened the feast.

Pushing thick meat wraps into your mouth and wolfing them down didn’t mix well with talking, so their conversation shrunk to “Pass me the water” and “that was my leaf.” “Get your own!” in varying states of muffling, depending on how much Barbecue the person speaking had in their mouth at the same time.

Jeno was full after a while, but he kept eating simply because everyone else was, and within 10 minutes the meat was completely gone.

Renjun groaned and tapped off his mouth with a napkin, like was in a fancy restaurant and hadn’t just probably eaten half his weigh in meat. Donghyuck didn’t bother using a napkin and rubbed his sleeved over his face.

“I’m feeling a little sick.” Jaemin admitted.

“Weakness disgusts me.” Donghyuck muttered, but he was probably feeling similarly if how he slurred slightly was anything to go by. 

“We should order more Soju.” Jeno decided, finding the bottle empty. 

“That sounds like a very reasonable and good idea.” Jaemin agreed and proceeded to flag down the waitress.

Donghyuck had pulled his phone out and frowned at the screen. Jeno hadn’t meant to look, but he was right next to Donghyuck and the name “Mark” was short and on top of the opened chat.

“Hey. Don’t think about him now, okay?” Jeno whispered.

Donghyuck quickly turned the screen off. “I know. It’s just… he didn’t even read my text from earlier? He asked me where I wanted to meet up, which is just weird because I’m here, obviously. I don’t know. Like I said, he never even answered, he probably meant to send it to Mina.” Donghyuck smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. 

Jeno wanted to cuddle him and make everything okay. Make Mark have feelings for Donghyuck that were more than those for a brother, too, or help Donghyuck move on quicker. It was not helping that he and Mark were living so close and still saw each other all the time. Donghyuck probably needed space to get over his feelings, not get reminded of them daily, which was why he kept snapping at Mark whenever they saw each other.

But it was like watching a landslide, Jeno could only watch as they broke apart further every day, both obviously unhappy with the situation but unwilling and unable to change it.

“In a situation when our crush hurts our feelings, we drink!” Renjun hollered and raised his glass.

“Who hurt you? I will punch them!” Jaemin gasped.

“Please do us all a favour and do that, starting with yourself.” Renjun clinked his glass with Jaemin’s, before throwing the shot back.

 

The next day, they went to see an Art exhibit that Renjun had wanted to see, but only after sleeping in and overcoming lingering tiredness and hangover with a rich breakfast.

The gluttony continued at Gwangbokdong Food Street and Jeno was sure he had already gained 5 kg or more within the last 24 hours. But it was well worth it.

They spent the evening at Busan Tower, staring over the city until the last rays of sun had disappeared and the thin sickle of the moon was alone in the sky that wasn’t dark enough to show stars. 

There was something magical about dark cities and blinking lights. 

“That’s probably what a fairy would look like, right? Plus sparkling dust.” Jeno sighed, eyes drifting over the outside.

“We should ask Dejun. He knows stuff like that, right?” Jaemin suggested. Kun’s boyfriend was known for his obsession with the supernatural. Funnily enough, he was a vampire, but could also tell you every detail ever published about fairies, ghosts, mermaids, and more, which all didn’t exist to Jeno’s knowledge. Supernatural ended with vampires and werewolves.

“Why are you suddenly so interested in fairies?” Renjun asked grimly. 

“I don’t know. It just… popped up. It was probably because Dejun kept bringing them up when we went there for Kunhang’s birthday.” Jeno shrugged. Fairies seemed quite magical, even to someone who knew Vampires and Werewolves. 

“Well… it’s dumb. I’m sure the fairies would be very offended to be compared to city lights.” Renjun decided, looking like he was personally offended as well.

“But they’re stunning! I’d be happy to be compared to them.” Donghyuck chipped in.

“Since when do you care about fairies and their feelings?” Jaemin teased, nudging Renjun, who started flailing. 

“I don’t. Like I said. It’s silly.” 

“Oh my god, if the three of you start your weird poly-stuff I’ll fling myself off this tower. Or you. That’s still up for decision.” Donghyuck warned “I hate being single! I should just download Grindr.” 

“What weird poly-stuff? There’s no weird poly-stuff.” Renjun hissed and turned, marching to the ice cream vendor they kept up here.

“There’s no weird poly-stuff?” Donghyuck asked, looking after him. “Either I’ve been interpreting things very wrongly, which, of course, is unlikely, since I’m a genius, you two are going at this wrong, or he’s denser than Jaemin never getting when I try to expose that Kun and his coven are...” 

In the darkness of the evening, the black ring, that flared up around Donghyuck’s irises as the bewitchment that forced him to keep the secret kicked in, went unnoticed. 

“Hella gay, yeah, I do know. Stop calling me dense.” Jaemin pouted and Jeno quickly started rubbing his arm to sooth him.

“I think we’re to blame.” Jeno admitted. 

“But how? Haven’t we made clear that he’s the cutest person under 1,70m around with the prettiest Chinese accent to ever creep into Korean language?” Jaemin dramatically sighed and leaned into Jeno for support.

“I’m going to be sick.” Donghyuck deadpanned “Let’s get off this tower before I decide to actually throw you down. I’m too pretty for prison. Johnny would be disappointed. And Dongyoung. He’d probably visit only to nag how I made poor choices.”

 

Renjun was still aggressively eating his ice cream when they were back downstairs, walking aimlessly in search of a good restaurant for the evening. 

It was very cute. Some of it got stuck above his cupid’s bow and Jeno reacted in time to hold Jaemin back from doing something stupid, like kissing it off. 

 

They were back at their room, showering one after another, when the email of the day arrived. It always came just past 10 pm. At this point, it was becoming nothing but a pain in the ass, and not the type that made him see stars in the best way possible. Jeno hadn’t even bothered to read it yesterday, but today his eyes were caught by the word “Busan”.

So, he opened the message.

“Lee Jeno,

The VX fighters for justice don’t play games. Offer up your information voluntarily or be forced and face the terrible consequences of not complying. 

If you think hiding in Busan will help, you’re wrong.

Mr V”

So he was losing his manners now. Jeno sighed and shook his head, before pressing delete. He wasn’t even hiding here, anyone could find him, but whatever. This guy was clearly painting his own narrative. There probably wasn’t even anyone else than him working on this. 

VX fighter for justice… sounded like something a 13-year-old might come up with. And wasn’t V the name of some pop star?

“Jeno, my back is sore, massage me, please!” Jaemin croaked from the bed on the other side of the room – meaning 1 metre from where Jeno was slumped, because the room was tiny.

Jeno put away his phone, deciding to read the newest release of his favourite web cartoon later, and waddled over, plopping down on Jaemin’s bed.

His boyfriend willingly laid down on his tummy and Jeno straddled him by the hips to reach everywhere he wanted. It wasn’t even three minutes in the massage, when Renjun came from the bathroom, bundled up in a thick sweater and fuzzy socks looking adorable and extremely cuddle-able.

Jeno pressed into a tight spot on Jaemin’s shoulder and the other let out an obscene moan. Jeno’s eyes were still on Renjun, who stared back like a deer caught in headlights, before his face quickly took a pretty shade of pink and he stumbled to the bed and climbed to the bunk over the one where Jeno and Jaemin were sitting.

“I thought I was clear no gross happy couples were allowed! What are you even doing, there’s people here!” Donghyuck screeched a second later, almost falling down from his own bunk and he threw random articles at the pair.

 

So, now massages were also banned.

 

Jeno hopped into bed after being the one responsible to air the room, everyone else snug under their warm blankets while Jeno’s fingers lost feeling from standing by the window to wait for the oxygen in the room to replenish.

He curled into a blanket burrito and checked his phone one last time. His eyes caught on the chat with Mark where the other had asked if they were in Busan already. His own answer also was unread, despite having sent well over 24 hours ago. That was odd. He hadn’t been fighting with Mark! Did he also get the cold shoulder now?

Jeno decided to have a talk with his friend once they were back in Seoul. Their train tomorrow would leave late in the afternoon, because Jaemin and Renjun had to get home for New Year yet they wanted all the time possible to see more of Busan. 

The fish market tomorrow would probably be nice. Jeno wasn’t sure buying a fish was a great idea when you had travelling ahead, but maybe they could taste something. Busan was famous for its fish, after all.

With thoughts of fresh fish, Jeno slipped into peaceful slumber.

 

Someone touching him startled him awake. The room was still dark, save for the faint light from the bright city outside streaming inside.

For a moment, Jeno thought it was Jaemin, because who else would it be? But then someone pressed a gloved hand over his mouth and Jeno immediately knew this wasn’t his boyfriend.

He screamed against it, but the sound was nearly perfectly muffled. His fighting training kicked in and he grabbed whoever was holding him down by the wrist, pulling, before tracking where the face would be. He swung a punch that connected to some part of a head and a low grunt came from the man.

The grip on him didn’t loosen though. Instead another person grabbed his wrists and held them in place. Jeno tried to twist out of the hold, but it was like working against steel cuffs, the grip of the stranger impossibly strong. Supernaturally strong.

Jeno started sweating in cold fear.

The people holding him pulled him off his bed like he was a puppet. He tried to bite the hand muffling him and a small grunt of pain came from the man, pulling away his hand.

“Let me go, I hrmpf.” 

The same man pushed up his jaw to close his mouth, and taped it shut. Jeno tried to twist away, tried to kick, use all those moves that he had been taught for situations such as this one, however, against someone able to command this type of brute strength it was useless without a weapon. 

Jeno knew vampires were wicked strong, but he hadn’t known it was to this extent. The Union was probably not aware of that either, or they’d be teaching it.

“Hey, what are you doing?” 

A new voice asked, clearly angry, and Jeno’s heart sunk. Jaemin. Clueless about supernatural, completely untrained in any field of martial arts Jaemin. Jaemin, whom he loved. 

Whoever had just muffled Jeno stepped over, his silhouette visible in the dim room. There was a dull thump and Jaemin’s body went slack, slipping off where he had sat. Jeno screamed, but the sound didn’t come out.

Tears started obscuring his vision and he tried to pull away with all he had now. He had to check on Jaemin! Was he hurt? Was he just unconscious? Or…

“Get out of here.” Someone whispered, a voice Jeno didn’t recognise but believed belonged to whoever had just punched Jaemin.

“Yeah.” The person behind him agreed, and a damp cloth was held under Jeno’s nose. The chemicals burnt, making his tears run faster, at the same time the room started to spin, the sounds around him getting softer.

Maybe, he should have paid more attention to those threats he had been sent?

Then, everything went dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I first named the rebels “VW”, then I realised that’s the abbreviation of Volkswagen. Evil car-makers trying to end the Hunting Union? Very threatening – not. They also have nothing to do with VIXX, who are a very peaceful, kinky coven living in Seoul. Mr V also doesn’t stand for Kim Taehyung, but for Mr Vampire. I know, real creative. 
> 
> Anyway, please mind the tags, it’ll get quite dark. I considered making this super dramatic and painful, but who’d gain anything from that? So I won’t and I’ll keep it as short as possible without taking away from my storyline, but it’s still kinda gore-y and brutal
> 
> [CuriousCat](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another slow update and the next one probably will take time, too. I tried to force myself to write this, but I got super stuck with the plot and deleted everything to re-write, but there’s so many problems with the story I’m facing right now, plus uni is starting for me. I know you’re all super understanding when I take time to write, so thank you for that, I hope you’ll continue to be patient with me >.<

When Jeno came to it, he was alone. 

The room was cold, like there was no heating and the ice-cold January air could just seep inside unhinderedly. His hands and feet were already numb from the temperature and goose bumps ran over his skin.

His mouth was still gagged, the tape pulling on his skin when he tried to work against it. There was no window in the room and Jeno had no clue what time it might be. It could be morning, noon, or still the middle of the night.

He looked around. The room was completely empty. The only thing that spoke of someone having been here before were dark splatters of… was that blood? Dried on the ground? 

Jeno shuddered and backed away. 

At least no one had tied him up. So, he tried to move his body a little, get his circulation back up and maybe warm up a little. He fumbled with the tape, but it hurt when he tried to pull it off, so he just left it. It didn’t bother him, not really. No one would hear him scream, but his kidnappers. And he’d rather keep them oblivious to his consciousness for as long as possible.

He checked for food or water, but there was nothing. So, he should try and not use too much energy in warming himself up. 

He slowly moved his limbs. Now that he was relatively fine, he thought back.

Jaemin!

Fear and worry immediately started choking him up, the image of Jaemin sliding to the ground replaying in his head over and over. 

Had they taken him, too? Was he in a room like this? Was he awake? Was he in pain? Was he scared?

Had the other two noticed?

Jeno squeezed his eyes shut. Hopefully no. He couldn’t bear the thought of either getting hurt, too.

 

He didn’t know how much time had passed, but he managed to get feeling back into his hands when the door was slammed open.

Two people, a grim man and a coldly smiling woman, entered. 

Jeno immediately looked away. There were super naturals involved in this. If there was a vampire, making eye contact would leave him open and completely vulnerable to their influence. A vampire only needed a second of looking into your eyes to slip into your mind and manipulate whatever you thought, felt, and remembered. 

His highest priority right now was not to fall under their bewitchment. It was the most important rule for Hunters and Jeno was sure it’d help him survive this and get out alive. 

“Good Morning. I see you’re up and well.” The female voice chirped. Jeno shivered.

“You’re at VX’s headquarters. If you had followed our invitation, this wouldn’t have happened.” The man said. 

Jeno snorted.

“Now, we only need the information from you, so we can work on our plan for total domination. After you speak, we will let you leave from this room, you’ll get food and water. You may even join our lines working to bring down the Union. Sounds good?”

Someone kneeled down in front of him and turned up his face. Jeno closed his eyes, but found the woman simply intended to take off the tape.

It stung, when she ripped it away, and Jeno’s hand flew up to press down on the smarting skin.

“Now talk.”

“Like hell I will!” Jeno hissed. Yes, he had his disagreements with the Union, but overall it was a reasonable institution. It needed some reforming and adapting, but like humans needed the police, vampires and werewolves also needed rules and someone to hunt down criminals from their lines!

“We know you’re against the Union, too. You can actually make a change with us. Become known and loved in the whole world.”

As if.

The leading positions were always filled first. If anything, Jeno could become some low tier for that power-hungry maniac that sent ridiculous email. God, he should have contacted Johnny about it! How could he have been so foolish and underestimate the threats?

Oh, right, because they were insane and would never work out.

However, even if they didn’t manage to overthrow the Hunting Union, which Jeno was sure they wouldn’t, they could still hurt him.

Hurt Jaemin.

Jeno took a deep breath, hoping to will away new tears. He knew how to act in a hostage situation, and not giving in to offers and tempting deals was a basic rule.

“You’re foolish!”

Jeno didn’t care. He kept his eyes and mouth firmly shut. Someone tried to pry open his eyelids. But he squeezed them close tighter and started aimlessly flailing.

He caught a short glimpse of the woman in front of him with only one eyes. Her eyes were glowing red - a vampire then, just how he had expected. But it wasn’t enough for her to infiltrate his mind and Jeno squeezed the eye close again as quickly as possible, when she backed away with an annoyed hiss from where he kept hitting her.

“Seems like some follower.” The man commented. 

“Why did you even leave, when you really try and shield them? Really, that wasn’t what I expected, when Mr V said he found some rebels that had dropped from the Union.” 

“Beats me.” Her partner answered, when Jeno remained mute.

“Urgh, whatever. See how you fare with being difficult.”

Steps started to disappear from his side. The door slammed shut and Jeno peeked through one eye to see if the air was clear. He was alone again in the dark room. 

He took a deep breath and centred himself. Mr V. The man who had signed the emails. So, he wasn’t an internet troll? Jeno should have made an effort and shown Johnny. Or Doyoung. That way, maybe he wouldn’t be stuck god knew where. 

What was worse was, that they had Jaemin, too. Hopefully at least Donghyuck and Renjun hadn’t been taken. 

Jeno groaned and rubbed his eyes, forcing away tears. He could do this. Just keep strong. 

He rose to his feet and patted to the door. He tried the handle, but it was locked, of course. He felt a little thirsty. Already. That was bad. 

Jeno decided his best choice was to save energy. There was nothing he could do right now. And since the people were after information, they’d probably not hurt him while asleep.

He curled up on the ground and tried to block himself from the cold as much as possible with only his pyjamas on himself. A light slumber took over.

 

The slam of the door woke Jeno. He still had no way to tell how much time had passed, but it had probably been between one and five hours. 

By now, their disappearance surely had been noticed. It was only a matter of time until the police found them.

So he told himself.

“Ah, there he is.”

Jeno immediately closed his eyes. Heavy boots came into the room, only one person this time. 

Someone grabbed his jaw and made him face upwards.

“How about you just comply and tell us what we need to know, hm?”

“What for?”

“Well, to kill everyone, of course!”

“That’s… insanity.”

“Is it? Or is the mindless killing they do insanity and we’re just fighting back? Think about it. Do you know how many wolf packs lived in this city before the purge? Not harming anyone, just living peacefully?”

Jeno bit his tongue. He knew the answer. It was considered the biggest success of the Union of South Korea to date. In the early 70s, they had killed 318 packs and 51 covens in Busan, eradicating all supernatural life in the city. The communities had hardly recovered, not to mention it was considered insane to live here with the Hunters drilled to keep the 0% quota.

“Exactly. The only packs making it out with some of their members were the Ji pack, the Kwon pack, and the Lee pack. Three. That’s less than 1%. And not a single vampire. Covens were burnt in their own homes. Children were shot. And you really want to shield the people who did that?”

“You’re twisting it.” Jeno bit back. “I won’t fall for your traps.”

“Fine, suit yourself. By the way, you can open your eyes. My kind doesn’t have the bewitchment ability.” Jeno didn’t. There was no reason to trust this man was a werewolf or human. Wolves and vampires usually stuck to themselves, that was basic knowledge and even confirmed by Kun and his coven. And humans… well, who knew.

Jeno wasn’t going to take any chances. 

“I’ll just let you know that if you don’t offer the information yourself, we will get it from you anyway. But it might hurt. Your choice.”

Jeno felt fear rise in his stomach again. 

But he told himself to trust the police to find them. 

The man snorted when Jeno didn’t speak, and left, the lock clicking into place loudly. 

The moment he was alone, he realised he was chattering from the cold. His skin was red, turning blue on his fingers and toes, and numb to the touch. His teeth kept knocking against each other. Jeno hugged himself tighter and tried to stop the shivering. 

They couldn’t kill him. If they killed him, they wouldn’t get the information they longed for. 

But why him? Wouldn’t it make more sense to… steal an actual Hunter and force information from them? There were so many things Jeno had never learnt, never experienced. 

Or maybe they had done that, too? How many people were there in this so-called union? How many hostages? 

He didn’t even know if he was still in Busan. He could be in the middle of nowhere for all he knew.

Jeno dropped his forehead on his arms.

Was Jaemin freezing, too? What did they even do with him? He didn’t know anything… They had to know that, if they had access to the data banks of the Union. 

For a short moment, Jeno wished the Hunters just kept all their information on that data bank, too, so there were no reason to kidnap people. Kidnap him. Hurt Jaemin. But the Union was smart enough to keep some secrets only written down in old books, locked away from the public.

 

The next person to come in didn’t slam the door. She also didn’t bother trying to speak with Jeno, instead, she grabbed him and pulled him off the ground wordlessly. He stumbled behind her, hoping she’d not let him fall down any stairs as he kept his eyes shut. 

It was a little warmer out here and Jeno tried to soak up as much of that as possible.

She pushed him between his shoulder blades and Jeno stumbled forwards, unable to properly balance himself while blinded and landed on his knees on hard concrete. 

Without even a comment, the woman walked back out and closed the door, just as softly as she had opened his. Jeno groaned and opened his eyes. The room was warm. Thank god. 

And it was lit. Jeno’s eyes had trouble getting used to the light, and he blinked and squinted, trying to see.

“Jeno!” someone gasped. A very familiar voice, but not the one Jeno would have expected. It wasn’t Jaemin, who had to be here somewhere.

It was Mark!

Jeno focussed the direction the call had come from, and saw Mark jump off a mattress and hurry over.

“Fuck no, how… why? Oh shit, did they get all of you, too?”

Jeno shook his head. Mark’s hands felt hot against his ice-cold skin, and the older helped him up and over to sit on the mattress. 

“Why are you here?” he asked, and Mark grimaced.

“Probably for the same reason as you. They want insider info. And you’re sure they don’t have Hyuckie? If they got you and me it’d make sense, don’t you think?” he bit his lower lip. Jeno was a little put off that was Mark’s only concern, but were he in his position, he’d surely react the same.

“I’m not. They knocked me out, but there were only two of them, and they had me and Nana.” Jeno swallowed down a thick lump in his throat.

“Shit, sorry Jen.” Mark groaned and awkwardly patted his arm. “I’m sure he’s fine. He doesn’t have anything of value for them.”

“Yeah. I hope so, too.”

Jeno took the blanket Mark offered and wrapped himself to warm up. They both were silent for a bit.

Then, his stomach started grumbling. It could be past noon, who knew for sure, but Jeno definitely felt his more basic bodily needs start to kick in.

“For how long have you been here?” he asked.

“Ha. I wish I knew. I waltzed right into their trap the day you left for Busan. They’ve sent me some weird emails, but I ignored them thinking it was Spam because they were written really whacky. And then they seem to have hacked Hyuckie’s phone or something. He texted me to meet and of course I went. I don’t know. I’m so dumb because I forgot you were already in Busan, normally he always told me, and ten times over. Anyway, when I realised, I texted you, but it was already too late. What day was it when they got you?”

“About two days later.”

“Ah. So less time passed then I though it did. Mina’s probably worried to death, because we were supposed to go skating together and I never came. New Year’s tomorrow or so… god what about my parents?” Mark traced the pattern the wrinkles made on the sheets. “I was so excited to hear Hyuckie wanted to see me. We’ve been best friends since forever and now we’ve been fighting over nothing but bullshit. I get he was hurt, but after that it just escalated. I just was my best friend back. Is that dumb? It totally is, right?”

“Not really, no.” Jeno shook his head. 

“Did you tell them anything?” Mark asked, voice lower.

“Not a fucking word, not from me. You?”

“Same. I don’t get where they got the idea I hated the Union from?”

“I’m generally confused how they seem to know so much about us, heaven knows how many files they hacked, how many profiles.” Jeno shuddered. 

“Yeah, for someone like you, who knows computer stuff, it’s probably even weirder than for me.” Mark nodded understandingly. 

They sat in uncomfortable silence for a bit, both deep in worry. Jeno’s stomach grumbled again.

“Do they ever give you food and water?” Jeno asked carefully.

“Yeah, sometimes. They tried to make me speak by dehydrating and starving me at first. Didn’t work, so they feed me now. I don’t know what they have in mind for you, though. I don’t know what else they plan to do with me.” Mark groaned.

“Hm…” starving wasn’t fun, but it also wasn’t the absolutely worst, Jeno figured. “Don’t you think the police should already be looking for you?”

“I… I hope they are. Mina should have noticed. Or my roomie. Someone would tell the police I’m gone, right? I wouldn’t bet money they’re above using some very medieval questioning methods.”

Jeno felt a little sick at the idea, but the wolf/human/whatever that had questioned him earlier had said it might hurt. He wasn’t sure he could keep quiet under all circumstances, even if he wanted to. He knew a little bit too much about torture to think himself immune to its effects.

“Busan should be a good place to get kidnapped by vampires and werewolves, and be found, shouldn’t it?” Jeno muttered. 

“Yeah. In theory.”

“I hate this.”

“Me, too.”

They fell silent again, both lost in worry.

 

Luckily, they didn’t seem to plan on starving Jeno. Mark and him both kept their eyes shut as the man bringing them food said the same threats of them getting the information, some way or another. 

There was only water and plain rice, but it’d do. They both ate slowly, chewing well and not leaving anything. Who knew when the next time would be that they got food?

“Just so you know, that room’s the bathroom. Seems like an appropriate time to mention.” Mark pointed at one of the doors.

“Ah. That’s nice.”

 

Lethargy won over, and Jeno dozed off on the soft mattress, his body tired from being cooled down and then warmed back up so quickly. 

But he got haunted by nightmares. Of them never being found, forever trapped in the windowless room. Of leaving the room, only to find Jaemin – lifeless in a puddle of blood.

Jeno jerked away with a small cry, startling Mark from his nap, too.

“What?”

Jeno looked around. But the room was clean, only the big mattress and blankets lying around. Even the empty tray was gone, so someone had probably picked that up.

“Nightmare. Sorry.”

“Understandable. Do you want to – uh – talk about it?” Mark looked awkward, and Jeno couldn’t hold a chuckle. Mark had never been the person to talk a lot about feelings. 

“No, it’s okay. Thanks, though.”

“Yeah, honestly, I’m pretty happy you’re here because I was going kind of going crazy all alone. So, uh, if you do wanna talk.” Mark shrugged “I can’t really go anywhere.”

“Urgh. Right.”

“I thought about it. You know the police only starts searching after 24 hours. So, it couldn’t have been that long since they started.” Mark rambled “I’m sure they’ll only really start worrying when it’s been 48 hours. So they probably haven’t even started looking for you.”

“Yeah. I guess.” Jeno nodded. Mark was trying to convince himself, but Jeno couldn’t blame him. It had only been a few hours – probably – for him, and it was already feeling like the room was very small and dark. Mark probably felt a lot more claustrophobic and hopeless than him.

“Maybe… you know, maybe Johnny or Dongyoung would think something’s up. Right? Maybe the coven would look for us.”

“I don’t think they’d be more effective in searching, though. The police have resources.”

“Hm yeah. I just… I’m hoping for anything.” Mark’s chuckle was dark. “I never thought I’d miss Donghyuck clinging and whining in my ear this much. And I missed it a lot recently.”

Jeno swallowed and tried to banish his longing for Jaemin. And Renjun. But at least he thought Renjun was in safety.

“What about Mina?”

“That’s different. They don’t know about her and they won’t find out, so she’s safe, for sure. With Hyuckie, I’m not so sure, since he used to train with you. They probably know about him.”

Jeno groaned and rubbed his eyes. His and Mark’s situations were on similar starting grounds – both their boy- and girlfriend were uninvolved with the Hunting Union, with the supernatural world, really. Only Jaemin had been at the wrong place at the wrong time, trying to do what he thought was right and gotten himself into danger, while Mina would hopefully be worried at home at worst. 

No matter whether or not Jeno liked her because he was on Donghyuck’s side in this, he was happy for Mark he wouldn’t have to worry about the person he loved and happy for her she wasn’t dragged into this mess she had nothing to do with.

If only that were true for Jaemin, too.

 

It was a blur of napping and staring into nothingness. Some rambling about the police finding them in different ways. 

When the lock clicked, it felt like that all came to a screeching halt and Jeno immediately squeezed his eyes shut, anticipation and fear mixing in his gut anew.

“God, I’m already fed up with these two, can you believe the boss?” someone snarled and Jeno was grabbed by his arm roughly.

“We should just turn you and make you join our mindless army. Fuck whatever you may or may not know.” Someone hissed right into his ear. 

Jeno shuddered from the breath ghosting over his ear. An army? A vampire one? How big was that already? Were they actually planning to overthrow the government?

No. Jeno tried to stop himself from jumping to conclusions. If there were that many people missing, something had to eventually point the Hunters their direction. You couldn’t just kidnap people in the thousands and get away with it. Not in a country like South Korea. 

But the adrenaline rushing through his veins didn’t fade, keeping him on edge as he was pushed around.

He heard the other guy, the one probably holding Mark, split away from them, and a door was shut, before he was pushed into a chair. He didn’t see, so he didn’t realise someone came up with thick strips of cloth until they wrapped around his arms, tying him to the chair.

“No.” Jeno tried to pull away but was pushed back down with ease. 

No one in Hunter training had ever prepared him for how strong a vampire or werewolf actually was. Even hanging out the with coven never made him even suspect the people surrounding him would be this powerful. 

“You could have talked. Well, you still can. Tell us about the hierarchy, the training methods, the codes and the attack strategies the Hunter use.”

“Fuck you!”

“Guess not.” Whoever was there sighed like he regretted it. 

Jeno expected a punch. Anything that hurt. But nothing came. Instead, the person spoke again.

“So. Lee Jeno, born 23rd of April 2000 in Incheon. Moved to Seoul in 2013 after losing his parents to a traffic accident.” Jeno felt a shiver down his spine. All that was correct. 

“Started training the same year… blabla… we have your record here. We have your university file, we have your employee file. One click… and your life is ruined.”

“What do you want to ruin? Kill my parents again?” Jeno hissed, fear making his voice come out a bit higher. 

“Hm, nice idea, but no, we can’t do that. However… what about very ungracefully getting kicked from your job? And with only 30% grades you wouldn’t have passed a single class and be forced to leave university. No recommendations, nothing. No one wants that kind of person as their employee.”

Jeno clenched his fists. It was true, no matter how good he may be. The competition was strong and the job market ruthless. 

“Or you tell us what we want to know.”

“You wouldn’t let me go anyway, so why does it matter what some hacker writes into my files?” Jeno spat. He did have official paperwork in the dorm. When the police found him, he’d definitely be able to undo the damage to done to his grades. 

His job… maybe not so much, after all, they had gotten through the fire wall unnoticed before. If they messed up Jeno’s work enough, or made it seem like he had violated rules, the evidence would be against him. But with the police on his side, he might be able to convince them anyway. Still, his fingers were trembling in fear over someone holding this kind of power over his life. 

“Hm… you think you’re so smart, don’t you?”

“I’m right, though, aren’t I?”

There was no answer, so Jeno figured he was. A small triumph. 

 

Mark was pale, when he returned to the room some time after Jeno. 

“Did you say anything?” was the first things he asked, before flopping to the bed limply. 

“No.”

“Good. That… we can’t say anything. Their threats… they’re empty. But our information seems to be genuinely important for them. We have to keep it, or they’ll probably kill us.”

Jeno nodded. 

Mark still looked ready to throw up.

“Wanna talk about it?” Jeno asked softly.

“No.” Mark rubbed his eyes “Yes. Urgh. I don’t know. They said they’d harm my family. I know it’s bullshit. But still. They know where they live and everything. I can’t help getting worried. Everyone’s home for the holiday.”

“Yeah, they got themselves a nice portfolio of personal information. Whoever leads this definitely has some near-genius skills in how to get past firewalls and encryption.”

“Mr V? Hey, that probably stands for vampire! Maybe he uses all his eternal free time to practice his hacking skills.” Mark laughed, because there were only two options: laugh, or cry.

“I wouldn’t even be surprised if that’s what it stands for.” Jeno mumbled. For once, he was glad to not have a family to be threatened with. However, they did have Jaemin. If they threatened to do something to him… but they seemed to not have found out he was something they could use against him yet.

Or maybe, that hit in the guest house room had been harder than just a knock-out…

Jeno felt sick. 

No. It was fine. Jaemin was probably super well and the police would find them soon.

“After this, Jisung will finally respect me as his elder.” Mark suddenly giggled.

“Are you sure Jisung respects anyone?”

Mark deflated. “Right. Damn. I was so excited for a moment.”

 

They were fed more rice and water, and Jeno started to feel a little gross in his pyjamas. Mark envied him, because while his clothing was warmer, it was also much less comfortable. They agreed to change their trousers and Jeno had never been so excited over a simple pair of denim jeans. 

 

The next time they were pulled from their room, someone pressed down on Jeno’s nails in an effort to squeeze information from him. 

It hurt badly enough to almost make him speak, but he remembered Mark from yesterday. If Mark could hold his mouth shut while having his family threatened, he could resist some pain. 

Whoever was there gave up, and tried to pry open his eyelids instead. When the man managed to force them open, Jeno crossed them to make it impossible for the vampire to enter, as there was no focus point. 

He got himself roughly thrown back into the holding cell. 

 

Jeno waited for Mark to come back. 

But he never did. 

The more time passed, the more Jeno started to feel dread rise. It was the worst feeling. Mark had been a big support, even if it was just both of them hopelessly rambling over Jaemin being fine, the Police finding them soon, or Donghyuck and Renjun being safe. 

The thought to be all alone again was much worse, now that he had had Mark around for some time. You can’t miss what you don’t know, so having been put together felt like a disadvantage or way to make them give in now that they were apart. 

Jeno tried to puzzle together how long it had been. His best guess was two days, because that was the number of times they had gotten fed, though the whole food thing wasn’t really meant to keep them satisfied, but rather to keep them alive, if his hunger was anything to go by.

 

When someone with new food entered, Jeno decided to count it as the third day, meaning he had been separated from Mark for half a day. 

“Drink this.”

Someone thrusted a glass in his lap and Jeno reached up to close his fingers around the sleek surface. 

He squinted at the liquid inside, suspicious why he was made to drink right away.

Blood red.

“No.”

“I said drink, it’s not a question.”

“This is vampire blood, isn’t it? I don’t want it.” Jeno refused. 

If you died with vampire blood in your system, you’d rise from the dead after 24 hours and live eternally – well there were a few things that killed a vampire, but in theory. A newly turned vampire was vulnerable. Easy to bewitch. Which was probably their goal.

“I don’t care if you want it. Drink!” the person ordered. Jeno felt his nose being gripped to force him to breath through his mouth and dump it down his throat. So, he raised his hand and threw the glass. He heard it shatter on the hard concrete floor and the person feeding him cursed. 

“I fucking hate you and your annoying attitude, do you hear me?” he growled, but Jeno couldn’t care less. The man cursed some more, but let go of him and thundered from the room, like an angry toddler that hadn’t gotten the toy.

There was a huge puddle of blood on the floor and glass shards everywhere. Jeno sighed and picked up the rice. He’d eat first, clean later.

At least he had something to do.

 

Mark still wasn’t back by the time the lock clicked again. The floor was somewhat clean, as well as Jeno could manage with only toilet paper to his dispense. 

“Here’s your dinner.” Someone snarled. Confusion spread in him. Had a day passed this quickly? Or were they giving him food more often now? It couldn’t have been 24 hours since the person with the blood had come. 

Then, Jeno heard another person stumble into the room. A moment later, he was yanked up from the mattress. A blade pressed against his wrist and before he could react, it was already cutting into his flesh painfully.

“Stop it!” Jeno hissed and tried to pull away, but to no avail again. However no one seemed to plan on killing him by slitting open his arteries, only a small trickle of blood ran over his hand. 

“Ah, ah, carefully, we still need him.”

He heard an inhuman hiss and then teeth embedded themselves in his arm.

Jeno’s eyes flew open, a spark of pain ripping through his body. 

A tongue lapped over his skin caught between the fangs and the pain disappeared into a faint buzz, the whole area getting numbed. 

That was a vampire who had their fangs in his wrist, drinking his blood. Jeno’s head started to swim in a weird haze, probably from the vampire venom getting into his blood to stop him from resisting.

The man with the blade was still holding him in place, and struggling meant he’d risk the razor sharp teeth slashing open his artery. All he could do, was try and get through to the drinking vampire with words, and the pure panic of possibly getting drained to his death made Jeno act through the dizziness in his head.

“Stop it! Stop! It!” Jeno’s voice was high and clearly hysteric, but he didn’t care right now.

His words seemed to get through to the drinking vampire, because he pulled away like he got burnt. Blood red eyes, so bright they were almost glowing, stared right into Jeno’s, wide and full of fear, as blood dripped from the fangs peeking over his lips.

Jeno stared back, unable to move, unable to find words as he realised who the vampire in front of his was:

Jaemin.

His fear got mixed with anger, not anger… fury. Fury at whoever had done this to his Nana. Some twisted, fucked up person, that had turned his Jaemin, who was completely innocent, dragged into this because of Jeno.

“Jeno. I’m scared.” Jaemin whispered, before a black ring of bewitchment flared up around his irises and he slowly backed away, face turning cold and passive, like he didn’t recognise Jeno anymore. 

That made him snap, like the final drop added to a barrel about to overflow. 

He used his whole body to throw himself around the vampire holding him, and without missing a beat he hauled the man over his shoulder. The body slammed into the concrete with a crunch. Tears were getting into Jeno’s way, but he pushed past them. He took aim and brought his foot down on the side of the surprised and overwhelmed man’s face. 

The kick held enough force to twist the head to the side so far the spine snapped with a gruesome crack. The man was limp on the floor, but Jeno knew he’d be fine in 24 hours and with a bit of blood.

Speaking of blood, his arm was still bleeding, drops of his own blood smearing the floor. It wasn’t bad enough to bleed to death soon, but enough to make a mess. Jaemin had missed his artery. On purpose, or because he was a newly turned vampire, that no one had properly trained yet, Jeno didn’t know.

He looked around, but Jaemin, of course, was long gone. 

He darted over and tried the door, but it was locked. Jeno slammed his fists against the metal.

“Nana! Nana! Jaemin, please!”

But no one came. Jeno slowly slipped to the floor, his tears flowing freely now. Jaemin’s last conscious words echoed in his head, as he tried to press down on his arm and stop the bleeding.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [CuriousCat](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I originally intended for this chapter to take a completely different turn (there were also some really interesting comments for possible plot turns), buuut it all fell victim to my deleting-spree, meaning this story will go quite differently from what I had originally planned, I take back anything I said in any comments about the plot – though I don’t think I said a lot? Idk. 
> 
> Btw, I’m from Europe, so the second story is the third in countries that count the ground floor as the first. Why I told you this will make sense later.

Jeno had stripped the dead vampire of his shirt and put that on, using his own top to wrap up his arm. He wasn’t sure how much more blood he could donate to hungry vampires. There were limits to that. And he was fed up, running on nothing but pure hatred and anger for this union of cruel rebels.

With Mark still missing and Jaemin being somewhere in this hell, probably scared and bewitched, maybe used as a puppet in this army, or whatever insane thing it was this Mr V was planning, Jeno decided he couldn’t stay here and wait for someone to find him.

There wasn’t much around to use to break a lock, and the man hadn’t had a key on him. At least he had a watch, which told Jeno that he hadn’t been far off with his assumption of three days having passed. He needed some wire to get into the lock, but there was nothing that held wire here.

Jeno tried the mattress. He almost cried in happiness, when he felt springs pressing down.

Now he only had to get into it without any sharp tool around.

 

By the time someone came to check on him, he had already worked himself half through the threads holding the edges.

“The fuck did you do?” the woman that had come inside snarled.

Jeno was still, eyes closed, hoping not to attract any attention.

“No surprise he didn’t return. Fucking useless, letting himself get killed by some… whatever. You better expect some fucking consequences from this, little fucker!”

Jeno deadpanned. He didn’t plan to stick around for shit to hit the fan.

 

It took him a bit, but with some biting and cursing, he managed to work his way through the outer layer of the mattress, ripping it open enough to reach one of the springs.

 

Getting the actual lock to open took almost as long. But then, it finally budged under his poking. Jeno’s heartbeat was thundering in his ears, as he pressed the handle and the metal opened slowly.

He was free.

Well. Relatively free.

Jeno twisted the spring and fit it in his pocket. A bad weapon was better than no weapon, after all.

Waltzing through a house full of supernatural creatures with accelerated senses, though? Bad idea.

Jeno took a moment to remember one of the first lessons a Hunter got, which was to calm his heartbeat to a point where it was hard to detect for vampires, unless they were on the lookout. There was no masking his scent from the wolves’ noses, but he’d just hope for the best.

He had to find Jaemin. And Mark. Had they turned Mark, too? Maybe he hadn’t been able to resist drinking the blood?

Jeno almost got upset again, but he took a deep breath and let the emotion go. He could worry later.

Maybe it would be better to flee and find help?

But if the Union found them, they’d not hesitate to drive a stake through Jaemin’s heart. Jeno repeated taking a breath and letting the emotion go. He didn’t have time to freak out. He couldn’t alert the police and by extension the Hunters. No. He was on his own in this.

He slipped from the room into the deserted hallway. A glance around revealed it to lead to more than ten doors. At the end, there was a window. Jeno decided to have a quick look outside, so he could figure out how high up he was.

The sky was dark, meaning Busan wasn’t close, but it was star-less, meaning it, or any other city, wasn’t far enough to avoid the light pollution. Jeno opened the window and looked down. He could see down the façade of the house. The second story. And the highest, only the roof above. Definitely too high to jump.

Jeno listened around, but the house laid in perfect silence. It was almost like there was no one else here… but that was impossible. Jeno was about to softly close the window to search the rooms, when a small speck of light, almost like a firefly, flew inside.

It flew around Jeno’s head once and he tried to follow it with his eyes, but it was small and fast. A soft buzzing sound, like that of a hummingbird only softer, came from it.

Jeno was a city-child, so he had no idea how fire flies were supposed to sound like, or behave, but this seemed a little weird. It settled on his shoulder and Jeno nearly cracked his neck trying to see it. Then, it just took flight again and left through the window. Against the moon-lit sky, Jeno suddenly saw the sparkling trail it seemed to drag behind.

He ran his fingers over his shoulder, and they came back glittering.

Odd. Almost… like a fairy?

Jeno sighed at himself. Now he was already going crazy for real.

He closed the window and started creeping to the first door. It was hard to keep his breathing steady and pulse low as nervousness rose in his chest, but there was no other way that seeing what was inside other than to look. It wasn’t a good plan, it was hardly a plan at all, but Jeno had to do something, no matter how pointless it might be.

Unsurprisingly it was locked. Expected, but still a disappointing. Jeno pressed his ear against it. Behind it was dead silence, probably nothing worth the trouble of opening it. So, he moved on, but got the same results. Again, and again. The last door led to a staircase and Jeno slipped into it and started sneaking down the steps.

If he didn’t find Jaemin or Mark before the sun started to rise, he’d probably best think of a hide-out. The thought of getting locked up again made Jeno want to scream.

He wished he could just leave, and tell the police. Get help. Get someone else to do it.

He wasn’t even a fully trained Hunter, he wasn’t fit for this job!

But he couldn’t. Not when they killed super naturals on sight, no questions asked. If he had to see Jaemin fall to ashes… no. It wouldn’t come to that.

He knew the vampires had their own laws and systems to ensure them, they’d probably catch Jaemin, break the bewitchment, and figure something out.

Wait!

That sounded like a plan. A pretty reasonable one at that! He knew vampires, after all! Kun’s coven!

Jeno almost sobbed in relief over the idea, forgetting some rather big obstacles, such as not having a single won on himself, nor a phone, and no clue where he was. He’d figure that out.

However, there suddenly were steps coming from the direction he was walking.

“Who’s there?” Someone called. Jeno froze, looking around, but there was nowhere to hide. He had been distracted for too long, thinking about what to do next, and been careless. That was going to kick his ass now!

Had he thought of a plan before leaving the security of his room, this could have been avoided. Too late now.

His eyes caught on the door leading to the first floor and Jeno raced towards the exit. He ripped it open and ran into the vacant hallway. There was a window in the exact same place as on a floor higher. A fall from the first floor wasn’t pleasant, but he’d probably be able to survive it. Maybe there was a way to climb down the façade, making it easier.

The exit was so close, only a breath away and Jeno lunged forward, but someone grabbed his waist and they slammed to the ground.

“Little pest, don’t think we’ll keep putting up with your attitude. Once we have the info we need from that little Hunter, we can get rid of you for good.”

Jeno struggled, but it was useless, he was pinned to the floor with nowhere to go, no good angle to hit or kick from.

“What do you even need the info for?” he spat, as he got pulled up.

“Just to finalise plans. We’ll build up our army and bring the Union down from inside out. No one would expect their co-worker to come back from the weekend as a vampire, right?” he cackled into Jeno’s ear.

So, they planned on turning Hunters and sending them back to work as normal. That was… not a bad idea. Jeno wasn’t sure they’d actually get through with that, but the idea itself made his blood run cold from how cruel it was.

“You won’t succeed in just stealing hunters off the street, creep.”

“Yeah, yeah, if we haste it. But we won’t. Too bad for you that you won’t be around for our grand success.”

The man rammed a knee into his back and Jeno groaned in pain.

He hadn’t even been free for over an hour and now knew he was set up to be killed, or turned into a mindless puppet and made into a killing machine.

 

Once more, he found himself back in a cold, unfurnished room, no window, no mattress, no blanket, just the cold concrete.

But the vampire wasn’t as smart as he thought he was, because when Jeno reached into his pocket, his metal spring was still there.

 

The lock was a different one from that in his old room. It was hard to get the wire inside and once it was inside, it wouldn’t move how Jeno needed it to.

He almost got smacked by the door when someone came to see him, managing to hide the wire just in time.

“Drink.”

Jeno didn’t bother trying to take the glass, already knowing what was inside.

“For fuck’s sake…” The man held his nose shut.

Jeno held his breath for as long as he could. Then, he took a quick gasp and clenched his jaw back shut.

“Can you believe this…”

The man grabbed his face and pressed into the muscle he was clenching. Jeno tried to resist, but the pain got too bad, the pressure too high, and he was forced to open. The liquid hit his tongue, metally and gross. Jeno tried to spit, but he was fixed in place and only a little bit drippled down his chin.

“Just fucking swallow.” The man grumbled “I’m going to break your neck the second I get the ok anyway. With or without this in your system.”

Jeno whined, but obediently swallowed. It was gross and he gagged immediately. But he didn’t get a break, another mouthful being poured right away.

 

The taste of metal lingered on his tongue, even long after the man was gone and he had munched down all the rice and tried to gurgle with the water.

Despite the treatment and threats, Jeno went back to trying to free himself from the room, poking at the lock tirelessly. It didn’t really matter anymore, at this point they already hated him. If only this stupid lock wasn’t double secured and would just open…

Jeno groaned in anger and frustration and rattled on the door, before collapsing against it, forehead pressing into the cold metal.

As he stared at the floor and tried to not let desperation get to him, the speck of light Jeno had seen from the window before squeezed itself through the small gap between floor and door.

Fireflies? Inside? Was this normal?

He was still trying to wreck his brain for biology lessons and faint memories of nature documentaries, when the speck of light settled down next to him and then… grew?

Jeno blinked, but yes, it was definitely growing, and quickly so, and when he blinked again, there was suddenly a person sitting next to him.

Not any person, mind you: Renjun, shaking his hair out and making a few sparks fly from it.

Jeno screamed.

“Sh!” Renjun’s eyes widened and his hand flew up to hold his mouth shut. “Do you WANT people to find us?”

Jeno just stared dumbly, trying to process.

Was Renjun a firefly, like… secretly? Did this mean he was in love with an insect? Hadn’t there been this disturbing film with a bee flirting with a woman? No this couldn’t be right.

“Keep quiet, okay?” Renjun whispered and Jeno nodded, so he let go.

“How did you find me?” he whispered urgently. “Wait. How did you get in here? Why are you a firefly?”

“Oh my god, I’m not a firefly.” Renjun rubbed the bridge of his nose “You have to thank Donghyuck for that, he was the driving force behind us not also getting kidnapped and then figuring out how to find you. Do you have any idea how hard it was to find an excuse why I’m missing New Years with my family? Couldn’t you have chosen a better time to get abducted?”

Renjun’s words were accusing, but his tone wasn’t and Jeno saw tears collect in his eyes.

All his confusion and fear were overwritten with worry over Renjun. He didn’t want to see him sad, ever.

Jeno reached out and gently petted his shoulder, making Renjun take a shuddering breath, blinking away the unshed tears.

“Anyway. I found you and that’s what counts.” Renjun grazed his eyes over him, catching on the blood stained cloth wrapped around Jeno’s wrist. “And we better get you out of here quickly.”

“No. I can’t. They have Nana. And Mark.” Jeno urged. “They have this insane plan to infiltrate the Hunting Union and bring them down. They basically just want to kill everyone.”

“The Hunting Union?” Renjun furrowed his brows.

“Yes. They tried to get information from me, because I used to train to be a Hunter.”

“Shit.” Renjun whispered and rubbed his temples “Shit, what? Are they insane? That’ll never work, if anything, the Union will go and lash out in some strike to protect themselves and innocent citizens yadi yadi yada. Busan 1972 all over.”

Jeno paled at the thought.

“I didn’t think they could actually cause any trouble. I got these emails from them and didn’t take them seriously at all. I should have asked Dongyoung or Johnny, this is all my fault.” Jeno groaned and buried his face in his hands.

“I highly doubt that, Jen.” Renjun soothed and Jeno felt his hand caress his arm. His skin tingled, a storm of different emotions making his head spin. “But to figure this out, we need to get you out of here first and foremost. I didn’t think it was some organised crime situation. Well, to be honest we were all a little confused what exactly it was, why you were targeted, but we expected it to be some small group. Do you have a clue where Jaemin and Mark are?”

“No. I only managed to escape a few hours ago and didn’t get to find them. I…” Jeno’s eyes wandered to the bite on his arm and pressed down on it. It still hurt, throbbing under his hand.

“Someone bit you, right?” Renjun asked and took his hand, pushing it off the wound. “Let me see that.”

Jeno had to press his teeth together as Renjun ripped the cloth away that had stuck to the scab and new blood welled from it.

“That looks pretty messy, did they let some newly turned have you for dinner?” Renjun muttered and Jeno felt his throat get choked up.

“Nana. It was Nana.”

Renjun’s head jerked up, his eyes big.

“They turned Jaemin?”

“Yeah. Maybe Mark, too, I don’t know. They gave me blood as well.”

“Oh my god.” Renjun whispered and Jeno saw the colour drain from his face “Not him, he doesn’t even know anything… why… he doesn’t…”

Jeno nodded, feeling tears sting in his own eyes now.

“Sorry, who am I telling this. Sorry, you’re probably worried over your boyfriend more than… yeah. Let me just.” Renjun suddenly pressed his hand on top of the rips in Jeno’s skin and heat started radiating from his palm, warmer than a human body should be.

Jeno hissed in pain and squeezed his eyes shut, but it only lasted a couple of seconds, before the burning sensation was gone, and instead of the throbbing from the incisions into his flesh, a weird feeling of pain-relief washed over him.

Renjun pulled his hand away and Jeno looked down, finding that his skin had pulled close, though it looked weirdly shimmery, leaving a crescent shaped scar clearly visible. Not to mention there was a sparkling Renjun-hand-shaped print on it.

“Sorry for the masses of glitter, I don’t know why that’s necessary.” Renjun blushed and Jeno inspected how it looked on his skin for another second.

“Wait, you said you weren’t a firefly, what are you?”

“Okay, have you ever heard of any fireflies that healed wounds or turned into humans? I’m a fairy, of course.” Renjun snapped and Jeno’s mouth shaped a perfect o. “Anyway, we wasted more than enough time here. We have to get the fuck out of here and then inform the coven we have a bigger problem on our hands than some kidnapping of college kids.”

“Kun’s coven?”

“Of course! Do you think Dongyoung will stay at home and drink tea when his favourite junior gets kidnapped? That Kun will watch his adopted humans get hurt by someone? Think again!”

“I’m not his favourite junior…”

Renjun rolled his eyes and got up.

“Right, about getting outside, the door is sort of… locked. And I already tried to open it, it might take some time.”

“Yes, don’t worry about that. I have to find Jaemin and Mark first, then I’ll tell the vampires and they’ll just kick it in or something. We don’t want to cause a ruckus and let them know we’re here too early, so they can’t go and take hostages, you know?”

Jeno nodded. The plan did sound very elaborate. Donghyuck seemed loud-mouthed and careless most of the time, but he was a smart cookie with some near genius ideas. They were much better prepared than Jeno had been, that was for sure.

“Good. Just stay here and lay low. I hope I’ll find the other two soon. If they were turned… it’s not good. They’re registered as missing, though not with the Department Four yet, but if the police get their hands on them.” Renjun shuddered.

Department Four was the official name for the Hunting Union, so the general public didn’t get what their specific job was. But they were so high in the hierarchy, they had their hands in basically everything, snooping out any supernatural activity. If they got wind, they’d take Mark and Jaemin out.

“I’ll hurry. Don’t worry.”

“I’m behind a locked door. I’m not worried over myself, but rather about you getting hurt.” Jeno frowned.

“I’m harder to kill than a vampire, believe me, plus I’m not on any list of targets because we managed to keep out existence a secret better than the vampires and wolves.” Renjun smiled and Jeno’s heart still broke a little at how pretty he looked. He’d rather go out there and fight some more useless fights than see Renjun even in the slightest danger, even more so after what had happened to Jaemin out of his sight.

Jeno’s heart sunk, as he thought of his boyfriend. Could he overcome this, could he forgive Jeno for having kept this secret from him, though not completely willingly?

“I know you worry about Jaemin, but I promise I’ll bring him back to you with everything I have.”

“I don’t only worry for him, I worry for you just as much. And I also worry about Mark, he’s my friend, after all.” Jeno mumbled.

“Of course I’m your friend, but it’s different from Nana, isn’t it?”

Jeno grabbed Renjun’s arm and pulled him closer.

“It’s not different from Nana, Renjun. I… we… I feel the same love for you as for Jaemin.”

Renjun stared up at him in utter shock, before pulling away. He didn’t shake Jeno off, but it still hurt, the rejection like a stab to his heart.

“How… how about we talk about that later?” Renjun stuttered and Jeno nodded. He was wasting time here, precious time Renjun should spend searching for Mark and Jaemin. But his own selfish needs had gotten to his head.

With another nod, Renjun shrunk back to the small sparkling dot and squeezed through the gap, leaving Jeno in the cold and darkness of the room, new emptiness filling his chest, rather than hope to be out of here soon.

Why had he said that? Why couldn’t he have left it for later, a better setting, better words, better everything?

What if he had just lost them both? Jaemin for not being truthful and Renjun for being too truthful?

Jeno groaned and buried his face in his hands, slowly sitting down on the cold concrete. Wait and lay low. Yeah, that sounded good right now.

So, a fairy, huh? Those were a thing? Suddenly, all those times when it had come up and Renjun reacted so oddly made sense. It just fit. He was so cute and tiny already, of course he’d have some healing magic and many sparkles.

Jeno’s heart filled with more love for his friend, only to remind himself that Renjun didn’t seem to feel the same way, had pushed him away. The feeling of heartbreak was bitter on his tongue.

His thoughts wandered to Jaemin, for the nth time since getting locked up in this hell-hole.

The face of pure horror Jaemin had had when he had pulled away from Jeno’s wrist flashed back up in his mind and Jeno’s heart broke all over again.

He traced over the scar. The skin was soft and sensitive, incredibly so, and seemed like it belonged to some other person with a different genetic make-up than himself. Or maybe it was just more fairy sparkles that made it seem so shiny and glowy.

At least a small part of both Jaemin and Renjun he could keep forever, no matter where this all led.

 

Time stretched on, as Jeno wallowed in self-pity and sadness.

Then, a bang and a shout suddenly filtered through the metal door and Jeno perked up. It was immediately followed by more yelling, though the words were lost on the way it quickly got clear there was fighting going on outside. Bodies were slamming and Jeno wondered how a vampire versus another vampire held up.

He had learnt that age gave them more strength and made their bewitchment stronger. However, strength could be cancelled out by skill, at least to a degree. Was Kun’s coven good at martial arts? Surely they were, right?

Jeno swallowed and focussed on what seemed to go on outside, taking his mind off things.

Someone seemed to fall against his door with a bang, and he jerked away in surprise. Did they want to get inside? The lock gave under another hit and Jeno wondered if it was time to put his own martial arts to use again – possibly only to find himself overpowered by another supernatural being, but the person in the doorframe was someone he knew well.

“Yo, Yangyang, I found the right door!” Lucas hollered down the hall and Jeno scrambled off the ground. “Hi Jeno, the rescue party has arrived.”

“Hi.” Jeno forced a smile, but in his mix of emotions he couldn’t really find the ecstatic happiness over being found he should have felt.

Lucas marched inside and swooped him off the ground – bridal style – and Jeno yelped.

“How’re you doing? Everything fresh and fine? I don’t smell any blood on you. Any broken bones to take care of?”

“No, I can walk.” Jeno lamented.

“Absolutely not. First of all, humans are way too slow and have no stamina at all, second of all, I’m here for the full dramatic rescue. Doie will be so impressed.” The last sentence made Jeno raise his eyebrows. It was kind of cute to see Dongyoung’s boyfriend try to impress him. Especially with how stoic he often seemed, having someone like Lucas be his lover was quite surprising.

But Jeno really could walk just fine on his own! Lucas seemed quite uncaring about that, as he marched out the door while holding him tight.

“Hi Jeno. Good to hear you’re doing well.” Another vampire belonging to Kun’s coven appeared in his vision.

“Thanks, Yangyang, I really appreciate the rescue mission.” Jeno smiled, only slightly strained. There was a suspicious layer of dust over the floor, as well as some clothing, and Jeno’d rather not think about what exactly must have happened here too much.

“Anytime. I also didn’t have any ulterior motives, I only did it from the good of my heart.” Yangyang gave Lucas a mischievous side-eye.

“Hey! So did I! I have a very good heart, I only want Dongyoung to see more of it.”

“Hm, sure.”

“Did you find Jaemin and Mark?” Jeno asked, interrupting their bickering.

“Renjun did, they’re downstairs. The others went to get them.”

Jeno sighed in relief. So, they should be safe. That was the only thing that mattered right now. As he was no longer in immediate danger and neither were the other two, Jeno felt exhaustion take over, incredible tiredness from days of insecurity and fear.

Lucas seemed to intent to carry him all the way back to Seoul or something, but Jeno stopped caring as the vampires descended the same staircase he had come up earlier with him still in his arms like a damsel in distress.

The lowest floor they arrived at looked even worse than the higher one he had been on. Not only dust and clothing was strewn around, but some lifeless bodies as well. So, the wolves and possibly humans were a thing? Jeno felt nausea rise in his chest, despite these people having tortured him and hurt Jaemin and Mark.

Yangyang and Lucas seemed much less bothered by the massacre and marched past it, reaching another door they pushed open, stepping out into the open. A cold wind hit Jeno’s face, making him shiver, but the fresh air was wonderful and he took a deep breath, relishing in how the oxygen filled his lungs and woke his body up.

“Sorry, I didn’t bring an extra jacket, forgot humans froze so easily.” Lucas apologised and finally let Jeno stand.

“It’s fine. It’s not too bad.” He assured “Where’re the others?”

Yangyang poked the screen of his phone with the awkwardness of a grandparent, something most older vampires did. “I can still hear Kun snarling at someone, so it’ll take another moment.” He informed. Jeno strained to pick up anything, but to his human ears the house lay in silence, save for the sound of cars driving past not too far away.

“We don’t like taking out anyone innocent, so we usually do a small interview before snapping necks.” Lucas explained “But there’s almost only extremely young vampires in this house and all of them seem to be on this revenge trip so. Unfortunately, no prisoners were made.”

“Yeah, I get why you’d be upset with the Hunters, they suck, no offence, but trying to bring the whole government down? A bit of an overreaction if you ask me.” Yangyang still hadn’t looked up from his phone and by his expression Jeno really wondered what he was looking at – or if he’d rather not know.

 

The wait felt like it stretched on for hours, rather than the minutes it probably was, and Jeno found himself pacing up and down, eyes locked on the door, until finally it opened.

The first person coming out was Dongyoung, followed by Sicheng who had a lifeless person tossed over his shoulder and Jeno’s heart dropped for a second, before he remembered dead vampires fell to ashes. Not dead then – or at least not dead for good.

Behind Sicheng came Jaemin, looking scared and tired, Kun being the last person to leave the house, a small speck of light on his shoulder.

“Nana.” Jeno gasped and hurried over. Jaemin’s eyes were on him immediately. Jeno feared to find anger in them, or worse, hatred, but instead they filled with relief and worry. “Oh my god, you’re alright.” Jeno couldn’t stop himself from patting his boyfriend down, like he had to reassure himself he was actually here and not some illusion his brain had come up with to torture himself.

“I… am… but are you?” Jaemin asked, his voice shaky, and he found Jeno’s wrist and pulled it up to inspect. Instead of the gash, he found the newly healed skin and his brows furrowed.

“It’s fine. Renjun took care of it, you don’t have to worry about that at all.”

“Renjun… what? But I hurt you! That’s… it was so awful when I realised, I never want you to hurt, yet I was the one inflicting pain on you.” Jaemin whispered, tears collecting in his eyes.

“And I didn’t tell you Kun’s coven is made up of…” Jeno felt the words get stuck on his tongue, as the bewitchment kicked in.

“Ah. Vampires. Yeah. I feel a bit dumb, I was so sure it was just hella gay.” Jaemin said, wiping away the stray tear from his cheek before he chuckled, and Jeno rejoiced in the soft sound. “But you tried to tell me, I get that it’s supposed to be a secret you have nothing to be sorry of, meanwhile I…”

“Also don’t have anything do be sorry for, at all.” Jeno assured him.

Jaemin slumped into himself, like a small pile of misery on two legs.

“I don’t even get why I deserve you, Jen, you’re the sweetest thing.” His eyes took a red shade and Jeno wasn’t sure if this was going to be a problem – after all, he was still a human, running blood and all. He knew there was no reason to be scared of the vampires in Kun’s coven, but Jaemin was a newly turned, maybe those were different?

But instead of another impromptu blood donating session, Jeno was wrapped into a tight hug that he immediately returned, holding onto Jaemin like his life depended on it.

There was no heartbeat where Jeno’s hands were on his ribs, but other than that, it felt how Jaemin had always felt – a bit lanky, a bit taller than himself, and like a koala squeezing all the love from you. If it were possible to freeze time right now, when he knew Jaemin still loved him how he loved Jaemin, with Renjun still being their mutual best friend and crush, Jeno would do just that.

“Guys, sorry for interrupting, but we have to get going. I informed Joohyun of the situation, because whoever’s the puppet master of this rebellion wasn’t here, and she’d like to speak to you.” Kun softly asked.

Jeno let go of Jaemin, who kept his hand in his, and his eyes fell on the speck of light on Kun’s shoulder, longing and sadness spreading in his chest again.

“Who’s Joohyun?” Jaemin looked around in confusion.

“Basically the ruler over all vampires in Seoul.” Kun explained with a shrug.

Right. Talking to the queen of Seoul. Wonderful, piece of cake. Jeno’s eyes landed on the person over Sicheng’s shoulder again and he suddenly recognised his own pyjama bottoms.

“Wait, is that Mark?” he gasped and stepped over. He looked… pretty…

“Yes, don’t worry, we found him passed out but his eyes are red, meaning he’ll wake up a some point within the next 24 hours.” Sicheng assured him.

“There’s a sudden influx of vampires to adopt, isn’t there?” Yangyang giggled and Kun threw him a disapproving glance, not bothering to rise to the bait.

“Let’s get going and talk things out with Joohyun and her coven. If these people are set on bringing down the Union, we have to get ahead of them, not only for our sakes, but also for Johnny, for the whole population of Seoul, maybe South-Korea.” Dongyoung reminded them.

Jeno nodded, suddenly feeling immense pressure and responsibilities weight him down.

In superhero movies it always sounded fun – save the world on a Saturday afternoon, look cool, and get the girl.

He squeezed Jaemin’s hand tighter. At least he got one of the boys…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [CuriousCat](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)
> 
>  
> 
> Btw, we'll be getting some Vampire Dreamies next Monday, I'M SHAKiNG!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ll just leave [ this](https://twitter.com/NCTsmtown_DREAM/status/1125378761719812096) here.

Jeno had known vampires were strong. Hell, the last days had made that abundantly clear. But when he found himself of Lucas’ back, holding for dear life while the vampire dashed down the freaking freeway, sometimes hopping out of cars’ ways, Jeno was sure this was what Quicksilver had to feel like.

Speaking of: Did no one worry he’d get whiplash here?

Apparently not, because they had just let him climb onto him and told him to hold on well.

So, that was what he was doing, as Seoul slowly came closer. 

At least they hadn’t actually still been close to Busan, or this ride would have probably taken long enough to freeze Jeno into a popsicle. January cold plus wind from unreasonable fast running? The stuff nightmares were made of!

 

Jeno’s fingers were stiff, red, and cold regardless of how quick the trip had been, and he was shaking softly as they knocked on the door of a luxury apartment downtown.

“Here. Take my jacket.” Dongyoung suddenly said from behind and another layer of clothing was put around his shoulders. 

“Thanks.” Jeno glanced over to where Kun was with Jaemin. Apparently, using his vampire strength came with some side effects for a young vampire like him, and currently Jaemin was leading a fight against his fangs poking into his lower lip. It looked sort of hot, but also very unfamiliar. Jeno would have to get used to that. His boyfriend with red eyes and fangs, without a heartbeat. And his crush able to turn into a tiny speck of sparkling light. 

Unfortunately, that speck of light was nowhere to be found. Jeno assumed he had left with Sicheng and Yangyang to get Mark back to the coven’s house and wait for him to kick back to life – or un-life. Jeno wasn’t sure how the specific wording worked. 

It was probably better that he wasn’t here, though, so he could focus on getting the information across well instead of getting stuck up on the rejection.

The door was opened by a woman dressed in a soft-pink silk robe, hair in a messy bun like she had just rolled out of bed. Jeno didn’t know the exact time, but it was still dark out, so it might be the middle of the night or the early morning hours. Definitely the time where you’d normally still be slumbering peacefully.

“Hi.” She smiled, before breaking into a yawn and opening the door wider, silently inviting them all in. Jeno felt not unlike some lamb in front of a pitch-black coven in a wolf-infested area. He knew of Joohyun and her coven, but no details, and frankly, the girls sounded nothing but intimidating. He was just Jeno, little former-hunter-trainee college student Jeno. 

Lucas easily marched ahead, like he was lining up for the all-you-can-eat buffet, and Kun and Jaemin followed next, the latter turned to hold out his hand for Jeno with a smile. His fangs had retracted to where they were hidden.

Jeno gratefully took it, feeling a little less scared with his boyfriend’s support.

The inside of the flat was nothing but posh. Expensive looking furniture, cleaned to perfection, meticulous interior design with not a single colour out of place. 

“Honestly, I really hope the dudes are just seriously crazy. Who’d be dumb enough to tickle the sleeping dragon? We all know the Hunters can become extremely dangerous.” The woman, Jeno didn’t know the name of, asked.

“We don’t really know the whole extent yet, we also only just learnt about that through Jeno.” Dongyoung explained and she nodded. They were led down the dark hallway and into a living room that also looked like someone had re-invented a castle into a Seoul downtown flat. 

Another woman stood in the open kitchen, pouring hot water into a teapot. 

“You were faster than I expected!” she said, finishing her task before looking up. Where the other looked fresh out of bed, she looked ready to attend a business meeting. 

“Well, it’s urgent, so we took the highway.” Kun explained while they all filed into the living room.

“Ever so reliable, that is why I like working with you. Sit down, don’t be strangers.” She gestured at the sofa-combination. Dark red leather… Jeno felt like it was too good to sit down onto, but he didn’t want to make a scene. 

The woman came over, bringing the tea with her.

“Seulgi, can you please get some cups?” she asked the one in the robe, who nodded and yawned again. She pulled over a chair from the small desk on the other end of the room and sat down, looking at them expectantly. “Welcome. Thanks for coming. I’m Joohyun, you might have heard of me.”

Jeno felt himself nod. She radiated this aura of confidence that made you want to comply, actually, he felt the need to bow down at her feet or some shit.

“I’m guessing you’re Jeno?” she looked at him, probably able to hear Jeno’s racing heart, and he nodded again. “Nice to meet you. And nice to meet you, Jaemin. Since you became undead recently, I’m especially happy to welcome you as part of the Seoul Vampire Society. If you have a moment later, I’d like to register you, just so we can keep a track of everyone in the area we have a list.”

“Sure, no prob.” Jaemin was leaned over the backrest of the sofa in an attempt to look cool. Jeno knew his behaviour in and out, so he recognised this pose easily and couldn’t hold a small, fond smile.

“Sorry we’re late.” The living room door was opened and two more women came inside, looking quite normal between the extremes of Seulgi and Joohyun.

 

It took a moment to fit all of them into a somewhat circle shaped form and serve tea to them all, but as they kept moving around and adding chairs, Jeno slowly came to the realisation that this was just a normal coven. Maybe the one ruling over Seoul, but they were only vampires, too, bickering between each other. 

“So, Jeno, Jaemin, please explain to us who exactly kidnapped and turned you.”

 

Jeno went first, retelling about the email he hadn’t taken seriously, to the people coming to their room in Busan, to the house and finding Mark. He left nothing out, he added their threats over his academic and job life. He didn’t retell his failed escape mission, because that didn’t add to the story. They needed the information of who, how, why, not on what Jeno had done in his free time.

Everyone looked grim by the time he finished.

“Thank you. Jaemin, do you have anything to add to that that we might have missed?”

“Uh, well, not really. They made all these announcements over having an army to me, too, plus the shock over the whole vampires and werewolves being a thing, but other than that, I don’t really remember much before Kun broke my bewitchment.” 

Jaemin threw Jeno a glance, telling him that he did remember their encounter, but Jeno had already known that. He wanted to reassure Jaemin that it was fine, but it felt like this wasn’t the right situation to do so. He’d definitely do it later, though.

“So, Jeno and Mark were targeted and taken for their connection to the Hunters’ Union. Jaemin, do you have a clue why you’d also be taken and turned?”

“Well, I think I just should have kept quiet when I heard them get Jeno? They seemed confused why I was there at first, until I let on that we were together, which I also shouldn’t have done, I realise now.”

Once more, Jeno wanted to reassure Jaemin that he couldn’t have known what they were capable of. Joohyun was still focussed on him, though, and Jeno was much too intimidated to show that sort of affection and intimacy in front of her.

“Most of the vampires they had there were very young, but all of them seemed to be on this path of thinking the union is absolutely awful. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like them, but they were so furious – and I don’t understand, could all of them have a personal motivation? There were about 40 there. The wolves, maybe, yes, but all these newly turned vampires? What reason could they have to hate the union, regular people don’t even know it exists.” Kun chipped in.

“Yeah, I wondered about the same thing.” Wendy nodded “I just think that maybe there’s a more elaborate indoctrination going on behind the scenes, you know, other than bewitchment. There’s many ways to infiltrate a mind even without using any sort of magic.”

“I don’t like that.” Joohyun tapped her fingers “I don’t like it at all. They’re too unpredictable. And trying the Hunters in itself is a suicide mission. It’s like playing with fire next to a gas station. You might be fine, or it might blow up and bring down the city with it, because the Hunters aren’t going to ask questions, they won’t listen when we tell them we’re uninvolved.”

“So, are we going to stop them? Find their HQ and take them out, or what?” Sooyoung asked, cracking her knuckles.

“No.” Joohyun shook her head and she deflated. “First of all, we don’t have a trail and they could be all over South Korea. Finding them would take ridiculously long and if they notice we’re onto them, which they might already suspect by the house these three were kept in being taken out, they could possibly try and hurry up, making mistakes that trigger some reaction from the Hunters that’s even more fatal.”

Understanding humming echoed from the rest of the group. Jeno started to feel like a small wheel in a huge machine. Unable to really influence anything, unable to even begin to understand the complex society that was the supernatural. These vampires were sometimes hundreds of years old, Jeno’s 20 looked very measly in comparison.

“I need to think it over. I have an idea, but it might be too crazy. I’ll need to get in touch with the wolves, let them know, let everyone know. For now, thank you Jeno and Jaemin, and thank you Kun.”

“Anytime.”

 

As they left the house and stepped back out into Seoul night, Jaemin pushed himself next to Jeno, slipping his hand into his boyfriend’s.

“You look tired.” 

“Yeah? Yeah, a little. There’s been a lot going on.” Jeno squeezed Jaemin’s hand back.

“Jeno, Jaemin, how about you come back to our house for now? Until we solve the problem with you still being reported as missing, I’d prefer for you to stay away from the public and the university just to be safe. You can sleep and figure everything out, how about it?” Kun suggested.

Jeno nodded. Today should be Saturday, he should have another day or so of holiday, so he wasn’t missing anything. He had planned to stay with Kun and his coven anyway. 

Wait. New Year’s. 

“Nana, what about your family?” Jeno asked, nudging his boyfriend. 

“Ah, yeah.” Jaemin smiled tightly “They probably noticed I’m missing, right?”

“It was your grandmother that reported you, Jaemin. I’m sorry, but you have to stay away from them for now.” Dongyoung pointed out.

“Right. Poor her, she’s probably running to the temple every day to pray for me.” Jaemin sighed. 

“We’ll figure something out, don’t worry, we always do. Well. Not me, but the others.” Lucas slapped his hand onto Jaemin’s back in a show of support. 

“Yeah, I’m sure we will. For now, we should catch up on some sleep.”

 

It sounded heavenly, just sleep and wake up to figure everything out since and smooth, but as Jeno laid in the guest bed, all problems ahead came back to mind. He tried not to toss too much to not alert Jaemin, but apparently he didn’t need to, because his boyfriend pushed a hand over Jeno’s heart and asked:

“Jen, please, it feels like you’re screaming next to me, what’s wrong?”

“I’m sorry, you should sleep, you’re tired.”

“Duh, but you’re tired, too, and if you have something so obviously troubling on your mind I can’t sleep. Please, tell me.”

Jeno sighed and rolled to his back, staring at the ceiling.

“I kinda told Renjun we were in love with him. Or I? I don’t remember quite exactly. It was on a whim and everything was really unplanned.” He took another breath, but Jaemin had never been the patiently waiting listener.

“He didn’t turn us down, did he?”

“I… I’m afraid he did. I’m sorry, maybe it was me, surely you would have chosen a better setting, better words, everything. I messed up.”

“No!” Jaemin rubbed his hand over Jeno’s cheek. “No, don’t say that. I know you said something meaningful and from heart, because that’s how you are, Jeno.”

“Okay.” Jeno felt tears collect in his eyes. “Damn thinking this couldn’t have been fixed with words makes it even bitterer. Did you see my wrist?”

Jeno pulled his hand from under the blanket and held it up. He could hardly see the outline of his body, but Jaemin traced along the scar, probably seeing clear as day. 

“It healed so fast…”

“It didn’t. Renjun, he healed it for me, he said he’s a fairy and it sparkled and… god he was so beautiful and that’s why I said it.”

Jaemin rubbed over his wrist once more, before letting go. 

“Sorry, I swear this is just a natural reaction, like a boner.” He mumbled and Jeno turned in confusion, but he saw the faint glow of red eyes. “Yeah, the fairy thing, he told, or rather showed me, too. I almost forgot over the whole other mess. It kind of just makes him even more wonderful.”

Jeno had taken Jaemin’s hand and pulled him closer now, disregarding the red eyes.

“He said he wanted to talk, maybe… maybe there’s still a little bit of hope.”

“Wait, he said he wanted to talk?” Jaemin sat up, making the bed shake. “Why didn’t you say so earlier? That changes everything!”

“That changes everything?” Jeno startled as Jaemin grabbed his face and started kissing him passionately.

“You old pessimist! If he wants to talk, he hasn’t turned us down yet! I believed in the power of love!” 

Jeno wasn’t quite as sure over love’s capabilities in making cute fairies suddenly change their minds over love confessions. But at least Jaemin was happy and kissing him, Jeno could appreciate that.

“Hey, what did you say about boners earlier?” Jeno gasped between kisses.

“Natural reaction.” Jaemin muttered and trailed a path of pecks down his neck.

“Right. And you don’t happen to want to do anything about it?”

“Please, Jeno.” Jaemin whined “Don’t be like that.”

“Stop whining and check the bedside table for lube.”

 

When Jeno stumbled into the kitchen the next morning, after trying and failing to wake Jaemin from his slumber, he was quite surprised to find no other than Mark on the kitchen table, looking a little worse for wear, but smiling when he spotted Jeno. Taeyong was making tea, humming under his breath, while Jaehyun hurried around the kitchen, handing his boyfriend any item he might need.

“Morning, Jeno. How’s it going?”

“Uh… well? I think? How about you?”

“Yeah, can’t complain.” Mark nodded. That was probably as elaborate as he would get without prodding, Jeno knew.

“Jeno, how are you doing? I’m so glad one of you came out of it alive. I mean. No offence, Mark.” Taeyong had come closer, gently putting a hand onto Jeno’s shoulder. 

“None taken?” Mark looked as confused as Jeno felt, seeing how Taeyong was a vampire himself, qualifying for the term dead just as much as Mark now.

“Yeah, I’m feeling pretty well.”

“That’s wonderful! Would you like some tea? Dongyoung’s currently getting something to eat for you, but I could offer you some fruits in the meanwhile?”

“Yeah, tea would be great.” Jeno nodded and sat down. It was odd that he’d be the only person in this house eating food. Wait! “Say, where’s Donghyuck?”

As if he had called for Satan himself, Mark tensed up next to him, looking around as if he expected his (former?) best friend to lunge himself at him any moment.

“He slept with Yangyang.” Jeno’s head jerked Taeyong’s direction in time with Mark’s “I mean, at his room, with him. That came out wrong.” Taeyong laughed nervously “He’s probably still asleep, he was pretty done earlier when Kun forced him to finally go.”

“I’m actually surprised you’re up already, Jeno.” Jaehyun said, sitting down next to him and immediately sipping the steaming hot tea. Jeno felt his own mouth burn from just watching.

“Yeah, well…” Jeno glanced at the kitchen clock announced it to be 9:04 am “Internal clock is probably still working.”

“We have a lot of things to do today. We need to figure out how to get Mark and Jaemin off the missing list without getting them onto the black list of the hunters’ union. Not to mention, Joohyun sent out a text calling for a full assembly in the afternoon.” Taeyong rattled down. 

Jeno wondered if his grades had actually been affected by the weird rebellion. If so, he’d have to march into the examination office first thing tomorrow, before classes picked back up, and have that corrected. Not to mention he had no idea what to do about his working student job. 

Hopefully they hadn’t pulled through with it.

“I really need to get off that list. I have about 400 missed calls, most of them from Mina, the rest from my family before they reported me.” Mark groaned. “I feel sick just thinking about how worried they must be. I need to tell them I’m fine.”

“Before you do that and before you meet them in person, though, we need to make sure you don’t accidentally show them any signs of vampirism. Will be needed for the police as well.” Taeyong gently explained. 

“I don’t feel very vampiristic.” Mark argued.

Taeyong and Jaehyun shook their head in perfect sync – a fascinating picture.

“Jeno, you don’t mind, right? Mark, just put your fingers onto Jeno’s pulse point, anywhere, neck or wrist.”

Mark sighed and did as told, pressing his hand against Jeno’s neck and not a second later, his eyes turned blood red. 

He jerked away as if he had burnt himself and opened his mouth, feeling for the fangs that suddenly poked from his jaw. Like Jisung normally would in his ever-clumsy state, Mark jabbed his finger and started bleeding for a second, before the wound closed and healed in record time.

“Shit. How do I make this go away?” Mark looked like a deer caught in headlights. A carnivorous deer.

“See? This is what you’ll have to work against first.” Taeyong patiently explained, while Mark scooted away from Jeno.

“When do I start? I need to get this under control!”

“Well, normally Yuta teaches this stuff…” Jaehyun started, and Mark jumped off his chair and was out the door before Jeno could even turn his head, gone at vampire speed. “I was about to warn him not to bother him and Sicheng in the morning, but okay. Let’s hope he doesn’t get scarred for life.”

 

[to Injunie, sent 08:55 am]  
“Morning, I hope you slept well and your family isn’t mad with you~”

[from Injunie, received 09:24 am]  
“Thanks for worrying, worry-Jen ^^ It’s fine tho, we’re having our New Year’s lunch today. Are you doing well? How’s Nana? Did Mark wake up?”

 

Jeno stared at his phone.

These were normal texts, right? Like… the type you’d write your best friend, not someone you were planning to cut all ties with because they confessed to you, right?

Or maybe he was just being polite. Or maybe he was asking him because Donghyuck was still asleep?

“Jeno? Are you alright? Your heartbeat is through the roof.”

He nearly threw his phone from where he had peacefully been having an existential crisis (yet again, Jeno was no stranger to them, though it had been a nice little break between those over figuring out his feelings for Jaemin and now), when Dongyoung addressed him out of the blue.

“Yeah, fine, super great. I didn’t hear you coming.”

“Oh, I brought breakfast for you.” Jeno stared at the grocery shop bag. He had thought instant ramen or maybe some rice balls, but there was leek poking from it. “I’ll make something delicious for you.” Dongyoung beamed.

“Uh – sure.” Jeno just nodded. Who was he to refuse a great homemade meal?

 

[to Injunie, sent 09:41 am]  
“I’m fine, Dongyoung’s making breakfast. Nana’s still sleeping. Mark woke up, he seems 90% fine to me, I think he’s training how to control this red-eyes-and-fangs situation with Yuta or something.”

Jeno very nearly threw his phone again, when the answer immediately made it vibrate, only a moment after sending his message.

[from Injunie, received 09:42 am]  
“Oh yeah, that must be inconvenient, shifting shape is hard to get a grip on. Hyuckie promised he was going to talk to him, but he doesn’t reply to my questions if he already did.”

 

“Jeno, are you sure you’re alright? Is there something upsetting I could help you with?” Jeno clutched his phone to his chest, as if Dongyoung had super vision and would read this… very boring text that was nothing scandalous whatsoever.

“Uh. Yeah. Totally.” 

Dongyoung raised an eyebrow, but went back to chopping. He replied to tell Renjun Donghyuck was still asleep. Again, he immediately got a reply. The more he wrote, the less Jeno felt like he was just waiting to get the message that he’d like to please never meet him again, thank you. 

By the time Dongyoung was done cooking and Jaemin came into the kitchen, Renjun needed to return to see his family, so he stopped answering, and Jeno felt this very stupid feeling of being-in-love again. He wasn’t sure if he should stop himself from feeling it when he had been so sure to get rejected, but he couldn’t help it. Talking to Renjun, even if it wasn’t in person, just made him feel like there were butterflies in his tummy. 

“That smells so yummy.” Jaemin purred, as he took the seat next to Jeno, who was blowing his Ramen (the real deal, not instant) in hopes of cooling it down.

“I’ll warn you: your metabolism cannot take it. But go ahead, we all make mistakes.” Dongyoung waved his hand at the noodles. Jaemin eyed them but didn’t go to pick up chopsticks to steal some. 

Jeno unlocked his phone and pushed it over, so Jaemin could see his and Renjun’s exchanged. The other scanned it, before throwing an arm around Jeno’s neck, making him drop his spoon into the soup that splashed onto the table.

“See? Told ya it wasn’t that bad!”

 

Apparently, Donghyuck and Mark actually got their shit together, because by the time Jeno saw the human emerge from Yangyang’s room on the lower floor of the three storied flat, he had red rimmed eyes but was dragging Mark along, who didn’t have the red rims, but red irises instead, from having his lunch push him around the house. 

On top of the burying of the hatchet between these two, there were more talks to be held. 

“We cannot have you walk into the police station and go ‘oops, sorry, honest misunderstanding, we’re not missing, kay, bye’.” Kun had his hand on a notebook and looked like a disappointed mom over Jaemin’s first, admittedly slightly questionable, suggestion.

“Can’t just someone hack into the data base and delete us off the missing list?” Mark asked wide eyed – still red, because Donghyuck was using him as a pillow while munching on some crisps that Jaemin and Lucas eyed with poorly concealed envy. Jeno wasn’t sure how long it took to get a grip on that, but he was already starting to get used to it.

“Well, yes, but how do you explain this to your parents and friends and family and so on? I mean, I even got texts from Chenle asking about you.” Kun shook his head. 

Mark frowned.

“Hey, can’t we just bewitch them all?” Jaemin perked up.

“Also a no. Bewitching masses of people has proved to a be poor strategy.”

“Not to mention it’s slightly immoral to do that to your own family, don’t you think?” Dejun softly chipped in “It’s bad enough you have to eventually announce your own death when you’re really still up and well.”

“Damn, that got real depressing real fast.” Jaemin mumbled. Jeno traced his fingers over the crescent scar on his wrist. There was so much more connected to these turnings than only the problem of them being registered as missing. In the long run, it’d fundamentally change everything.

Jeno tried not to think too much about the clock of life being frozen for Jaemin, while it kept ticking for him.

“That’s still years ahead, let’s focus on the current problems.” Kun soothed “The best path of action would be to mix you into some bigger event. I’m not sure about the rebels, but they probably have more planned. It makes most sense to find you at some crime scene, once you have good control over your vampire gifts that is, so you seem like survivors.”

“But that could be weeks, months even ahead.” Mark stuttered.

“Possibly not, depending on what Joohyun is planning. I’d like to listen to what she has to say at the assembly and then plan according to that. She knows we still need to get you back into the public, so we might be able to work together on it. Maybe the wolves have someone missing as well, who knows.”

Mark didn’t look too happy with the solution, and Jeno was honestly not feeling any better despite not even being affected directly. Of course, the vampires wouldn’t look for the fastest solution, but for the safest. After all, they had all the time in the world. Humans, like him, like Mina, like their families, hadn’t.

“I mean, look at the bright side – no university if you’re reported missing.” Jaemin grinned.

“Please, why do you have to remind me? You cruel person!” Donghyuck whined loudly, bunching up the empty crisps bag. 

“Right. School. I guess I’ll be headed back to the dorm in the evening then.” Jeno nodded slowly. Jaemin immediately had himself wrapped around his boyfriend.

“No! You can’t! I need you to warm my bed!”

“Hey, if you’re there maybe you could bring me some clothing?” Mark asked, ignoring Jaemin’s usual antics “I feel weird borrowing so much.”

Donghyuck loudly complained why Mark was asking Jeno, when he lived in the same building and he’d be the obvious choice to ask. Jeno watched as his friend started clinging to Mark who tried to carefully peel him off.

It looked familiar. Very much so.

In both good and bad ways. 

This was obviously their usual banter.

Meaning, this was also a Mark still very much keeping it platonic, and a Donghyuck desperate for more that he was being given.

Donghyuck in love with Mark, who was in love with a girl.

A feeling of impeding doom spread in Jeno’s chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After today's save NCT Dream, I kinda want to write Vampire!Jaemin and Renjun taking in Werewolf!Jeno, I saw it all over Twitter. Too bad I can't make Jeno into a werewolf in this AU or you bet that'd be where we'd be going now.
> 
> My Twitter is @155Fox, you can talk to me if you want :)
> 
> [CuriousCat](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)


	6. Chapter 6

“Hey, Jeno, may I see your wrist?” Jeno was snapped from his dark precognition by Dejun’s ever sweet tone.

“Uh wrist?” Jeno stretched out his hand in confusion. Dejun had been a vampire for a little longer than Jaemin and Mark, turned last summer (and completely on purpose), but in comparison that still made him very young and inexperienced. Was he looking to trigger some red eyes, too?

“No, the other one please, the one with the scar?”

Oh, right. Jeno internally face palmed and changed hands. Dejun gently took it, but his eyes remained dark.

“Fascinating. I’ve never seen a fairy’s healing.” He whispered.

“Wait! You knew Injunie’s a fairy?” Jaemin screeched, jumping off his chair, making Jeno startle.

“Renjun’s a fairy?” Mark asked.

“Renjun told you he’s a fairy?” Donghyuck squeaked.

“Oh yes, I was quite surprised to find that out myself, though I never doubted their existence, of course. Would you mind if I took a picture for my personal research purposes?” Dejun smiled brightly.

“Guys, what the fuck, can someone please fill me in?”

“Why did you know he was a fairy? And why did no one tell us?”

“I only found out recently and you were both being such idiots with your poly-crush thing, of course I didn’t expect him to tell you morons.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I explained it to him, okay? There’s no more misunderstandings about the poly-crush-thing!”

“What? Did you confess?”

“Okay, what the fuck I’m so lost right now.”

“Yeah he did, really well, I’m sure, I mean, I wasn’t there, but I’m sure it was great.”

“Shut up, you’re way too whipped to judge objectively. Jeno, I need the details! Were you turned down? Why isn’t he here and being all grossly in-love with you two?”

Jeno and Jaemin exchanged a glance.

“Yeah, that’s where it gets … difficult.”

“We weren’t turned down, though!” Jaemin cut in.

“Yet.” Jeno added softly.

“Well, tell me when it’s time to chose sides between the broken couple… triple? I’m still undecided who deserves my full support.” Donghyuck snorted.

“Oh, you mean like with you and Mark?” Jaemin narrowed his eyes.

“Come on, that’s different, Hyuck and I aren’t in love. It doesn’t compare at all.” Mark shook his head.

“Yeah. Totally.” Donghyuck nodded and Jeno knew that it wasn’t only him giving them two the judgmental-pity glance.

 

Apparently, a full assembly of all vampire and wolves meant just that: all vampires and wolves. As in: no human boyfriends.

“It’s not like I was the genius behind getting your sorry asses from that kidnapping thing.” Donghyuck snorted loudly, as he and Jeno walked up the hill to the university dorms.

“They’re probably not going to talk about plans, she knows it was you.” Jeno soothed. The campus was already getting crowded again, people had obviously returned from their holidays to be on schedule for classes tomorrow. It felt odd, thinking that he’d just waltz into a class in less than 24 hours, like nothing had happened, like his boyfriend and him hadn’t gotten kidnapped, Jaemin been turned, Renjun wasn’t a fairy, and Jeno hadn’t confessed. That no one had ruined his grades… hopefully he’d find all those print-outs that proved they weren’t actually that terrible, or it’d be bye-bye university education and hello searching for a sugar daddy.

“Well, their loss if they do.” Donghyuck huffed and called the lift.

“I just feel really bad for Mark and Jaemin not being able to go to classes. I mean, Mark has a ton of friends outside from us, too. Plus their families, did you talk to the Lees?”

“I did. They’re taking it pretty well, I think. His father used to be a hunter, too, after all. They know the risks.”

“Yeah, I guess. At least it’s almost the semester break so there’s not that much they’ll miss academia wise.” Jeno wished he could call Jaemin’s parents, but that’d require they knew about his existence.

They arrived on Mark’s floor and pushed past a group of guys fighting over the volume of the music. Donghyuck typed in the combination for the lock and opened it.

“Anyway, let’s get some stinky underwear and… oh.”

Donghyuck froze with one foot in the door, blocking the entrance, but Jeno was tall enough to easily look over his shoulder and see the girl on the bed look up at them.

She was going through what looked like binders of important documents, her face bare without the usually soft make-up she wore, her hair in the messiest bun Jeno had ever seen. Mina!

She narrowed her eyes at Donghyuck and him, but he saw tears pool in them.

“Ah! Now you come, huh? The great best friend, taking a comfortable week off before deciding that maybe it’s important to help the police so they can find Mark. I’m amazed by so much compassion.”

The insult and accusing tone made Donghyuck snap out of his stupor immediately, too fast for Jeno to maybe hold his mouth shut.

“Oh please, don’t pretend you know about anything I do. All you know about me is my name, and that you hate me and don’t want Mark around me for reasons I can’t possible fathom, which is why you make him tell me lies.”

“There you go again, painting your own narrative without even having talked to me for more than two seconds. Yes, I don’t know you well, because you made damn sure I didn’t get the chance to. And what did you do, huh? The police didn’t once see you, all the information they needed, all the minor details, I was the one having to scrap it together from his dorm. Hell, I’m not even allowed on this floor, but here I am.

“You probably knew Mark’s police work wasn’t just police work, how I thought, but for an elite team. You could have helped me, no wait, you despise me so you wouldn’t have. You could have helped Mark, who’s somewhere out there, maybe not even in the country anymore but shipped of to China so they can harvest his organs or something like that.”

“Believe me when I say I did more than my fair share of ensuring Mark would be found. And, please, don’t be ridiculous, of course I knew about the police stuff. I’ve known him since we were still in kindergarten, after all.”

“See? I don’t have that advantage! I’ve only been dating him for three months. I was aware I didn’t know him that well yet, because he never really talks, especially not about himself, but you could have helped me, worked together with me. I don’t even get why you hate me so much? It’s not like I’m competition for you, you’re his best friend and he makes time to spend with all his friends, study buddies, team mates, so he would have time for you despite me and him dating. You don’t fight with, say, Jeno, who’s friends with Mark, too. It’s almost like you just don’t want him to find a girlfriend and be in love.”

“It’s not like that at all. I only hate manipulative people who make my best friend lie to me. I want him to have someone, but not someone with such a poor personality.”

“Wow, thanks, I’m manipulative now? Okay, what did I even do? You almost sound jealous, like some girl that’s been trying and failing to get his attention, and now you’re being completely over-dramatic.”

Jeno felt Donghyuck freeze in front of him and Mina’s angry expression suddenly fell when he didn’t immediately spit back new accusations. The silence was thick and stifling, dreadful even, and felt like it stretched on forever, like thick chewing gum.

Then, Donghyuck broke it with a shrill, fake laugh. “Please, don’t be ridiculous. Jen, are you getting the stuff? I’ll be in Nana’s dorm.”

He turned and pushed past Jeno, who was caught between running after Donghyuck and trying to do some damage control with Mina. When he looked at her again, she didn’t seem angry anymore at all, just wordless surprise colouring her face.

“So.” Jeno cleared his throat “That’s awkward.”

She snapped out of it and looked at Jeno as if she only now realised he was there.

“Yeah. Uh. Sorry for that.” She sighed deeply “I’m honestly stretched thin, the last week was nothing but a nightmare. I just wanted to have a nice and peaceful holiday and instead I’m running in and out of the police office.” She closed the binder “You’re probably off no better than me.”

Right. Jaemin was missing, his boyfriend.

“Yeah. I didn’t really have plans for New Year, though.”

“Still. I know it’s hard to worry. I mean, it’s kind of weird, my mother asked me if I was maybe over-doing it since we’ve only been dating for a few months, but I… I really miss him, I worry so much for him. I took it out on Donghyuck, but I was so pissed off, I never realised he was in love with Mark and that was the reason for the whole fight. I thought you and Jaemin were the gays in the friendship. God, this makes everything even worse. And Mark probably has no clue about his feelings, he’s always kind of dense about the whole romance thing. It used to annoy me, but right now I’d do anything to make Mark miss the cue to take my hand and ruin the mood.”

She rubbed her hands over her face. Jeno wasn’t sure what to do with his new found title as “gay in the friendship”.

“Well, Donghyuck’s had this crush since forever. It’s not on you to figure that out for them, but no, Mark has literally no idea about his feelings.”

“Yeah, that’s just typical.” A sad smile spread on her face.

“I’m sure Mark and Jaemin are just fine and will eventually return, so don’t stress yourself out too much over it, alright? There’s only so much the police can do with some paperwork you give them, so don’t overwork yourself.”

She sighed and nodded “Thanks, Jeno. I admire your mindset. I just feel like the second I take a break I’m giving up on him, like… betraying him by not doing something when I could be, no matter how insignificant and unlikely to help it is. It’s easy to lose hope.”

“Yeah.” Jeno nodded, remembering how devastated he had felt during the days of isolation in the house.

“Anyway, I’ll finish up here and will try to be as positive as you. Oh, wait.” She stood up and hurried over to the desk, where she ripped a small note from a pad and scribbled down something, that she then handed over to Jeno “That’s my number, could you please give it to Donghyuck? In case he wants to talk. I’d really like to make peace, the whole situation… at first, I thought it’d be easier to just try and push him out of our lives because his behaviour was pulling Mark down so much. But Mark going missing really made me reconsider some things and… I’d like to be friends with him, if he’s willing to give that a try.”

“Oh. Okay, sure, I’ll let him know. Just a warning, he can be a little stubborn.”

“That hardly comes as a surprise.” Mina laughed softly, a real one, that reached her eyes.

 

Jeno found Donghyuck in Jaemin’s room, stuffing clothing into a duffle bag.

“So? Did you make friends with the enemy, too?” he asked, narrowing his eyes at Jeno.

“Hyuckie, I’m your friend, you know that, right? I only talked to her, she isn’t evil incorporated.” Jeno gently chided.

“So what? Now she knows and that’s even worse. She’ll tell Mark and use it to ruin everything I just patched back up.” Donghyuck slammed the full bag on the bed.

“Okay, first of all, I don’t think she’ll tell Mark. What does she have to gain from that? She’s not a bad person, I’m sure of it. And secondly, did you really patch it up? From what I saw, you just went back to the status quo where only one wrong word could break everything back down again.”

Donghyuck slammed the back again, clearly out of frustration.

Jeno waited, as he could almost see the wheels turn in his head, letting him come to his conclusions from what he had just said.

“Urgh. I hate it when you’re right. I just… I just don’t know what to do? Why is this so hard? Why can’t I just… not have feelings? I want to be Mark’s best friend, just his best friend, without this stupid crush and this stupid jealousy whenever he gets close to Mina and they look cute and lovely.”

“I’ll tell you how to get over a crush once Renjun turned me down and I had to do it.”

“Sounds good. I mean. Not that I want you to get turned down. I think you’ll be absolutely unbearable as three, though. So.” Donghyuck sniffled and blinked away some tears.

Jeno was about to inquire how exactly they’d be unbearable, when the bathroom door was flung open and Jaemin’s neighbour barged inside, swinging what looked like a Star Wars laser sword.

“Hands up, there’s no use in trying to steal anything, Nana only has worthless shit.” He yelled, then he seemed to recognise Jeno.

“Hi Felix.” Jeno waved as friendly as possible to avoid getting hit with a plastic sword.

“Dude!” Felix lowered the toy, relief taking over his features “It’s you! Man, I thought someone came to steal his stuff. You know. Since he’s gone for the holidays. Just being a good neighbour here, since I couldn’t go home might as well do something useful.”

“That’s… that’s great.” Jeno nodded. “Thanks for keeping an eye out. We were just getting some stuff.”

“Sure thing, man.” Felix waved the laser sword and slowly backstepped until he closed the bathroom door and disappeared.

“Jaemin has weird neighbours.” Donghyuck drily commented.

“He’s nice, though. The other guy, too, they didn’t give us a hard time when they found out we were dating.”

“Do I even want to know how he found that out?”

“No.” Jeno felt heat rise to his face.

“Ew. Okay, well, weird but nice then. Let’s leave before we get staked or something. I know I won’t wake back up like Mark did.”

 

Going to a class he shared with Jaemin alone felt weird. Going to class and knowing Jaemin and Mark were across town, learning vampire stuff, was even weirder.

If there at least were a deadline, until when he had to be alone and when Jaemin and Mark would make their re-appearance on the campus.

But there was no date to cling to. Instead, Jeno kept addressing the air next to him.

The meeting the day before had apparently been messy. Jeno could only imagine what was going down when you locked a few hundred old people into one room and tried to get to a conclusion. Old people usually also clung to their opinions like it was a sport, in his experience.

Regardless, Joohyun had come to the conclusion that they had to work together to find the rebels and then eliminate them to avoid the Hunting Union feeling threatened and possibly killing off all supernatural life in the city. But she had also said it was too risky to tip them off by letting Mark and Jaemin re-appear before they had any proper leads.

So, they had to stay hidden for now.

Jeno was a little annoyed, especially when she had originally said it’d be too hard to find them with nowhere to start looking.

Maybe she had to let go of her original idea, she had said it was a little crazy, probably not something the assembly would agree on, Jeno tried to reason with himself. He just wanted Jaemin and Mark to be able to see their friends and families again soon. And, if he was being very honest, and slightly selfish, for a moment, he wanted Jaemin here with him…

The good thing was, that most of their lessons were already taught, some students hadn’t even bothered to return from their holiday to attend the last two weeks of classes, so Jaemin would hopefully not fall behind. Until the new semester he’d surely be back, Jeno hoped.

Going to the examination office and getting all his grades corrected to avoid being kicked for missing his marks hadn’t been very pleasant, especially since the lady responsible for him had given him this extremely judging glance at least ten times, but at least that was figured out.

How to solve his job problem… well, he had sent an email and he’d probably come and see tomorrow for his shift.

“Hey Jen, you’re looking gloomy.” Jeno startled back to reality.

Renjun! It was Renjun, in the flesh, walking next to him suddenly, looking pretty, and tiny, and hug-able. Jeno’s stomach was filled with butterflies all out of a sudden, worse than he remembered it to usually happen around the other. Maybe it was the nervousness over not really knowing where he stood with him?

Wait, had he just said something?

“Uh…”

“Are you dropping by Kun’s later?”

“Yeah, yeah I’ll go there after my last class.”

“Will you stay overnight again?”

“Uh, probably?” The truth was, it had been so easy to give in to Jaemin’s puppy eyes when it meant avoiding Renjun and the inevitable rejection Jeno was still waiting for.

“Ah, okay, I get that. Say…” Renjun glanced around, biting his lip. Jeno felt his heart sink. Was he going to tell him it wasn’t going to work out like that? Please no, Jeno at least needed Jaemin with him to dampen the blow. “Do you think I can come over maybe?”

Thank god, not yet. Another delay that’d buy him more time to prepare, but would ultimately just make him foster hope. Jeno would still take it. Anything, to keep this weird, wobbly balance act of pretending that he hadn’t confessed.

“Yeah, sure, I don’t think that’ll be a problem at all.” Jeno nodded dumbly.

“Good. So, uh, so we could talk? Since, you know, what you said? Or did you just say that? I’d totally get that, we can just forget it happened.”

He wanted to forget it even happened… No, he hadn’t been turned down yet, he could still believe in “the power of love”.

“No… I… I did mean it.”

“Hey, no, Jeno, please don’t jump to conclusions. I just, I really need to talk to you, both of you. There’s something that…” Renjun took a deep breath “That I haven’t told you yet, that I feel like you need to know, okay?”

“Is it about the fairy thing?” Jeno lowered his voice to a whisper.

Renjun’s cheeks coloured in a light pink and he chuckled. Jeno felt himself get lost in the sound of it, it really was a cute chuckle… “No, it’s not, it’s unrelated. Okay, so, let’s talk later, but don’t… try and don’t already freak out before I even told you.”

Wait, so whatever he was going to tell him was likely to make Jeno freak out?

He wanted to inquire more, since this was just fucking confusing and not helping with the jumble of emotions in his chest whatsoever, but Renjun was already making his way through people down the hall. Jeno sighed as he watched him disappear in the masses.

Well, time to text Jaemin and panic.

 

Jeno returned in the afternoon, feeling more drained than he should from just a few classes, finding the lesson on vampirism still in full swing.

“Making blood smoothies is easy.” Yuta slammed his hand on top of the blender and Jeno startled in the door. “You just pick whatever you like, throw it in there, and then blend on the highest setting until it’s all liquid. Well, okay, you do have to remember to add enough things with water in them or it won’t ever become a smoothie, but that’s easy. Blending meat is where it gets gross.”

With those words, Yuta dumped a kiwi, bell-pepper, mango, and what looked like green onions but could be leek into the container, closed the lid and set it to full power, the sound of the blades turning immediately filling the kitchen.

Someone tapped Jeno’s shoulder from behind him, and he turned to see Kunhang smile at him.

“Hi, you’re back already?”

“Yeah, didn’t have a full schedule today.”

That woke the interest of the two focussed vampires, who turned. Jaemin broke into a full-on beam and bounced over, throwing himself at Jeno.

“Welcome home! I missed you!” he tried to kiss him, but Jeno was quick enough to avoid it, getting a slobbery ear instead.

Yuta turned off the blender and cleared his throat. “Attention, Disciple Na. We’re getting to the most important step!”

Jaemin stopped trying to smooth Jeno and stood straight. Impressive. How had Yuta managed to gain his respect to this extent?

“The blood.” Dramatically, Yuta opened the fridge door, which should be extremely lame and anticlimactic, but Jeno found himself sputtering when it opened to reveal a full stock of… well, blood. Jeno had seen a blood bag before, but this many, meticulously sorted by type, lit by the small bulb inside, was something else entirely.

Was this how police officers felt when they found a mass murderer’s bloody crime scene?

“I personally think B is the only drinkable one, but opinions differ, so you can go ahead and see what you like.” Yuta took a B-bag from the fridge and ripped it open with practiced ease. Then, he emptied it into a cocktail glass and added the questionable concoction he had come up with, finishing it off with a straw – reusable, of course. Vampires were very much into protecting the environment for the obvious reason that they’d be around to see shit go down when Global warming made the earth uninhabitable.

Jeno watched as Yuta took a sip and nodded in satisfaction, like he hadn’t just drunk the worst combination of fruits and vegetables anyone had ever come up with.

“Well, that was disturbing, yet again.” Kunhang stated, speaking what Jeno had been thinking.

“Please, it’s not that terrible. I’ve had worse.”

“Surely you also had better.” Jaemin mumbled.

“Well, you’re free to come up with your own ideas, grow, explore… just don’t take the last pack of B in case we’re low.”

 

Thrity minutes later, Jeno found himself in the guest room where he and Jaemin had been staying, the vampire sipping on an orange mixture that could have passed for something super normal, but had the metallic scent of blood and triggered the red-eyes-fangs-situation in Jaemin.

“It’s called red state. Because that’s easier.”

“Ah. I see, you already learnt more in one lesson with Yuta than in years of school.”

Jaemin pouted “Not true.”

“I’m just teasing.” Jeno smiled. He would have reached over and squeezed Jaemin’s cheek or maybe even given him a quick peck, but Renjun was sitting on the desk, adorably dangling his legs, and Jeno wanted to absolutely be on his best behaviour, just in case that might change anything.

Jaemin sighed and took another sip of the drink, and Jeno felt his eyes wander to the scar on his wrist, so he turned his hand to hide it. He knew Jaemin felt guilty, and he hated it.

“So.” Renjun cleared his throat for the first time since entering the room. Both their attention was immediately on him. Jeno dreaded what he’d say next. On one hand, he’d rather know where he stood, get any misunderstandings and useless hope out of the way right now. On the other hand, he didn’t want to be turned down, no matter how small, it was better to have some hope to cling onto than know it was useless.

“So?” Jaemin parroted when nothing followed.

“I’m thinking!” Renjun snapped “I mean. Sorry. Give me a moment, this is hard!” he sighed. Jaemin put down his almost empty glass and looked at Jeno, raising and eyebrow. He still hadn’t gotten used to the red eyes…

But he understood the silent question, and both of them got off the bed and sat down on the desk, next to Renjun on one side each, not close enough to touch, but close enough to not feel like there was a barrier between them and Renjun.

Jeno searched for Jaemin’s hand behind the other’s back and found it, taking it to reassure himself.

“Okay, so, this is embarrassing, but I need to be very clear here. Jeno said he-he likes me, as in romantically, but also likes you and said you like me as well, but also him?” Renjun had gestured around and now his arms were kind of knotted together from pointing around so much.

“Yeah, I think that’s it.” Jaemin nodded.

Renjun glanced at Jeno, who confirmed it again.

“It’s called poly…”

“I know what it’s called, oh my god, please don’t make this any more embarrassing than it already is!” Renjun quickly held Jaemin’s mouth shut, who blinked his red eyes at them both.

“Then, why didn’t you realise we were flirting with you?” Jeno asked.

“Well…” Renjun blushed a little “I did kinda, but I also thought it was just… for fun? I didn’t think you were actually serious! Not that many people would consider a non-monogamous relationship and you two just, I don’t know, you fit so well, it’s this dream-team-couple thing. I don’t see how I’d fit in there.”

Jeno was tempted to take Renjun’s shoulders and shake him, but that probably wouldn’t help. Luckily, there was someone else here today.

“We think you’re missing. It’s like a Renjun-shaped hole. Maybe we seem like the dream couple to you because every time you see us, you’re there to close that hole. You only didn’t realise it was so perfect because of you.” Jaemin explained, using words so beautifully to describe that Jeno once more regretted not leaving the first confession to him.

Renjun sputtered and Jeno, honestly, felt a little flustered himself.

“This is too cheesy.” Renjun finally stuttered.

“It’s my honest feelings.” Jaemin pouted, and a fang dub into his lower lip.

“Me, too, I feel like that, too.” Jeno chipped in “We absolutely both want you to be with us. If… if you want, that is.”

And there it was again, the ugly fear of rejection.

Renjun shrunk into himself and sighed. “Right so, uh, that’s all really great, I thought you were kind of maybe playing with my feelings a little. But it’s good to hear you didn’t.”

“With your feelings?” Jeno asked, feeling particularly dumb.

“Yeah, well, I like both of you, romantically that is. Originally is was only Jeno, but when you two got together, instead of getting over that, I developed a crush on Jaemin was well. So that was fun.”

“That’s perfect!” Jaemin yipped and grabbed Renjun’s hand with his free one. Jeno was still trying to contemplate the words. So… he wasn’t turning them down? On the contrary? That was, indeed, perfect! The nervousness was slowly replaced with happiness, the hyperactive one that made you want to bounce around.

Jaemin seemed similarly affected, only Renjun was still sunk into himself, not looking all that bright at all.

“Well, maybe not? I… there’s something that might be a deal breaker?” He glanced at Jeno. “It’s kinda important, so.”

The happiness was immediately gone, like someone had dumped a bucket of ice water over Jeno.

“You shouldn’t force yourself to tell us if you don’t want to.” He assured him, feeling like he was the reason, rather than Jaemin. Being the one pressuring the person you liked to tell you something that was obviously private wasn’t a good feeling, Jeno under no circumstances wanted that. Renjun had to be ready, not feel like he had no choice.

“No, I thought about it a lot, I really do want to tell you, I wanted to for some time, but I’m honestly a little worried over the reaction.” Renjun laughed nervously. “You know, sometimes it’s easier to live in the uncertainty of not knowing than getting the reaction you were hoping not to get.”

Funnily enough, that was how Jeno had felt for the last two days.

“Why should we give you a bad reaction? I don’t think… wait, since you’re a fairy, are you actually engaged to some Peter Pan or something? Or… or like in the stories where Fairies curse people, and they suffer and stuff. Oh my god, you’re not a mass murderer, are you?” Jaemin gasped.

“What the fuck? No! Where do you even get those ideas?” Renjun slapped Jaemin up the head, who whimpered.

He took another deep breath, before adding “I… I’m not just a boy, like, a guy. Some days I am. But some days… I’m a girl.”

There was a moment of silence as Jeno waited for something more. But nothing came, and he slowly realised, as he watched how small they made themselves appear, that telling them this was already very scary by itself.

“Okay.” Jeno broke the silence. Renjun looked up, surprise on their face.

“Okay?” They repeated.

“Yep, super-okay. Wait! Not okay!” Jaemin gasped, looking horrified. Not as horrified as Renjun, who jerked around to look at him “Did we misgender you the entire time?”

Renjun groaned and clutched their chest “Really? Like… no: that’s not a thing, you can’t just change your mind depending on the day, gender doesn’t work like that?”

Jeno felt anger. “Well, it’s your experience, how can I tell you what you’re feeling isn’t real? That just dumb.”

“Yeah! Obviously we need to make sure we always know which pronouns you prefer!” Jaemin nodded eagerly.

“Uh… yeah, okay. Okay.” Renjun nodded, looking a little dazed. “Don’t stress too much. The only people I told so far are Sicheng and some online forums. Which… some of the latter didn’t take it so well. So I don’t think I want more people to know yet, okay? So maybe stick with the he, so they don’t find out?”

“But if we’re alone, we could make it so it fits, right?” Jeno asked.

“I… I never… never had anyone do that.” Renjun blushed “It’s all still pretty new, to be honest, that I finally figured it out. I originally thought my girl days were just… weird days, until I figured out that it was really just girl days. It still feels new to say it. But… you’re gay, I mean, I get it if you changed your mind, knowing I’m not a guy. I’d rather know it now than, you know, figure it out later.”

Jeno blinked. He tried the she for Renjun in his head, tried to think of them as a girl and if that’d change anything.

“No. It really doesn’t.”

Renjun blinked once, twice, then they straightened from the slouched and tiny position.

The confidence looked even better on them, their commanding aura was something Jeno had fallen for, after all.

“Wait, so, if I like you and Jeno, and Jeno also likes me and you, and you also like Jeno and me…” Jaemin wildly gestured between them “Does that mean we’re all dating now? I mean, I can’t go on any dates but… in theory?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m not sure I understood the system of Lunar New Year holidays correctly… I usually try and keep everything here as realistic as possible, but this was hard, I’m sorry :(
> 
> I had this idea to include more representation in this AU, we have gay, pan, bi, ace, but those are all romantic/sexual orientations. Exploring other gender identities seemed like a bigger challenge to me, since everyone’s experience is so different. I researched a LOT about it, also about non-cis peoples’ tips on how to write non-cis characters, and if they thought it was okay for me to write them, as a cis person. They all encouraged writers to include them, so I did, but I’m very nervous to make any mistakes or mis-represent anything, so if I did, please let me know (but please keep the death threats to a minimum, I won't answer to them anyway, thank you).
> 
> The term I believe fits best for Renjun is Bigender, but there’s lots of umbrella terms, like Genderfluid, Genderqueer, etc. that might fit as well.
> 
> If you have any constructive criticism or suggestions, I’d love to hear your opinions here or on [CC](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155) 😊


	7. Chapter 7

Jeno looked at Renjun expectantly.

“I… I guess? Wait, why do I have to figure this out, I don’t have any dating experience, it’s you who should know how this works!”

“I never dated more than one person, either!” Jeno gasped.

“It was a mess when we first started dating, I wanted to make it right this time!” Jaemin whined. 

Jeno blushed when he remembered how Jaemin and him had figured things out. It really hadn’t been as smooth and romantic as you might want or imagine it to be. It had been almost two months of this very weird phase from kissing, to Jeno spacing out under the shower because he was thinking about Jaemin, to fast and secret hand-jobs, to Jeno finding himself thinking about Jaemin while he was supposed to code, to drunk sex that really wasn’t something he recommended if you had to sit for a seminar the whole next day, to finally making things official as boyfriends and telling their friends. 

“So, can we, like, tell people?” Jaemin asked.

“Well… maybe the coven?” Renjun carefully suggested. “They’d understand.”

They looked insecure again, and it really wasn’t a look Jeno liked on them. He wished he could just kiss it away and make them stand up tall for themselves – was tall as Renjun could that was.

Wait.

He actually could now.

So, Jeno traced his fingers over Renjun’s jaw and tipped their face up a little, which Renjun easily followed along, looking up at Jeno for a moment, before closing their eyes. 

It felt almost like a spark between them, when Jeno pressed his lips to Renjun’s, similar to how it sometimes felt with Jaemin. But kissing them was different and Jeno wanted to find out all the ways in which it was, and how to make Renjun feel the best they possibly could. 

But not right now. Jeno pulled away and saw Jaemin stare at them, eyes bright red and blown. 

Renjun blinked their eyes open, looking as dazed as Jeno felt, then cleared their throat and turned to Jaemin, only now seeing the look the other had on. 

“That was both so sweet and so hot.” Jaemin whispered. 

“Oh my god, I don’t know how to deal with this.” Renjun breathily said.

“Well, I’d suggest kissing me, but, uh…” Jaemin gestured to his teeth, that looked ready to slit a person up. 

“Shut up, you’re not the only immortal in this relationship.” Renjun turned and pulled on Jaemin’s shoulder to bring him closer. Jeno felt like watching his boyfriend kiss someone else should maybe be weird. But it wasn’t. Of course, it wasn’t, this was Renjun, their other significant other. He just felt the warmth of affection spread in his chest as he watched Renjun close the distance and press their lips against Jaemin’s, who immediately found their waist and closed his eyes. 

A new thought seeped into his mind, and the second Renjun pulled away, Jeno had to ask.

“Wait, you’re immortal, too?”

Renjun and Jaemin looked at him in surprise and Jeno realised he had sounded a lot more whiney than he had intended to. 

Jaemin hopped off the table and wrapped his arms around him in the blink of an eye, too fast for Jeno to catch him even moving.

“Don’t feel shut out because of that!”

“I don’t. I was just surprised, I didn’t realise Injunie was going to not age, too.” Jeno noticed he was still whining. 

“Oh, actually, I will for a little longer. Fairies and Vampires don’t work the same, just because we’re both considered supernatural doesn’t mean we share our biology. Werewolves, too, differ greatly. I was born and obviously grew up, if you can recall that we grew up together for a few years?” Renjun snorted “I grew, like, 4 cm!”

Jeno had grown 10 cm in the same time, but hey.

“Wait, so how does that work? You can turn into a tiny ball of sparkles and heal wounds?” Jaemin pulled back.

“Okay, listen, I’m neither a firefly.” Renjun glared at Jeno “Nor a ball of sparkles. I’m a F-A-I-R-Y and I can’t help the sparkling, I didn’t invent that shit.” It seemed like a sore point. “I can shrink myself, just how you can grow fangs.” Renjun tapped their fingers to Jaemin’s mouth. “And fairies are born like humans. Well. Not like humans, it’s actually a whole lot of magic and flowers… anyway, I obviously grew up and at the normal human pace, but I’ll stop aging once I hit 25 and stay like that until killed.”

“I’ll protect you from getting killed!” Jaemin yelped and squeezed Jeno tighter. 

“That’s nice, but I think it’d rather be the other way around.” Renjun patted his arm. 

“Wait, do you have super-strength, too?” Jeno asked, hoping to find out every detail Renjun was willing to give him. It was just so exciting.

“No, but I have magic, which works even better.” Renjun looked a little proud, and rightfully so. 

“Well, I’ll train Martial Arts with Sicheng and then I’ll be even better than you at keeping you safe.”

“I’d like to see you try.” Renjun grinned. Jeno didn’t want to join this argument of who would keep the group safe, just from how Jaemin was making him lose feeling in his arm because he was holding on too tightly was enough to tell him he was the least suitable person for the job out of all of them.

Speaking off. 

“Nana, I still need my arm, would you maybe loosen your hold a little?”

“Oh my god, I didn’t mean to… are you hurt? Where does it hurt!” 

“I’m not hurt.”

“I’ll make it up to you! I’ll kiss it better.”

“Here, please.” Jeno grinned and tapped his lips. 

Jaemin didn’t even hesitate a second to fulfil his promise and press his lips to Jeno’s. When he pulled away, Renjun was watching them, their cheeks flushed a little deeper than before. 

Cute!

 

Jeno ended up leaving a pouty and whiny Jaemin at Kun’s house, late in the evening, to travel back to campus with Renjun. 

They couldn’t hold hands, not on the street, but they kept bumping into each other from walking closer than normally and each time Jeno couldn’t stop himself from giggling like a madman until Renjun pinched or elbowed him to calm down.

Jeno had always liked how Renjun would be hands on when someone annoyed them. Even Chenle, who really was close to being the most persistent and shameless person, didn’t dare try his luck with them after nearly suffocating from a tickling attack that Renjun had launched on him.

Now it didn’t hold any feeling of aggression, nor did it strike fear in Jeno. Instead, he had trouble not breaking into more giggling when Renjun touched him.

“I’ll age to 25 in only one year if this keeps up!” Renjun huffed, after they closed their dorm room door behind themselves, finally granting them privacy. 

“I’m sure you’ll be just as beautiful at 25, so I don’t mind.” Jeno grinned and grabbed Renjun by their waist, pulling them close and kissing them, just because he could. 

Renjun let him, and Jeno lingered on their lips a bit longer, without pushing further. This was different from Jaemin, Renjun was different from Jaemin, so of course, their relationship wouldn’t be the same. But Jeno didn’t want Jaemin 2.0, he wanted Renjun and all the aspects that made them the person they were and all the ways in which a relationship with them would work and differ.

“Nana’s terrible influence, now you’re starting to talk cheesy lines, too.” Renjun huffed, when Jeno let them go.

“Thank you, but I’m afraid I’m nowhere near his level yet.” 

“It wasn’t a compliment!” Renjun mumbled, but they didn’t sound like they meant that and Jeno only laughed.

 

The next day, Jeno had to go to work. After seeing his grades all altered to some absurdly low ones, he feared that his boss had been sent some sort of reason to have him fired, too, but his employee card worked on the door and on the check-in point without trouble. 

Just to be safe, Jeno stepped by HR before heading to his own office. 

The woman there seemed confused, checked, but told him no, there was nothing out of the ordinary and if there’d be, she’d make sure to alert their boss first. 

With a sigh, Jeno flopped down on his desk and happily signed himself into all data banks and files. There was an email with tasks for the day.

“Oh Jeno, hi. Did you have a good New Year holiday?”

Jeno glanced over his screens to see Yeeun return from her break.

“Hi Yeeun. Yeah it was… eventful. How about you?”

“You know how it is, family fighting over minor issues, too much food, I’m honestly glad to be back at work.” She smiled tightly.

“Sorry to hear that.”

“Ah, I didn’t want to pull down the mood. Hey, did you see the news? There were two students from your university kidnapped over New Year. Do you happen to know them? Na Jaemin and Lee Minhyung?” 

“Yeah, I heard of that.” Jeno nodded, trying to keep on a straight face

“Terrible, really. I hope the police find them soon. To think things like that happen here, in South Korea. Especially since there was another abduction today. Maybe it’s the same person behind that. Imagine, getting locked up by some psychopath. Terrible.” She shook her head.

Another abduction today? Jeno hadn’t checked the news yet, stuck in classes in the morning and headed directly here after. 

He started the automatic search in a customer’s website that was acting up and pulled his phone from his pocket. The group-chat of Kun’s coven he had found himself added on to, and had ignored for the morning because it had blown up and the last three times this had happened it had been people posting memes, was full of information regarding another kidnapping that had made headlines today. Jeno swore he’d suffer through memes and clownery next time to not miss vital information again.

He scanned the article Johnny had posted and the replies. 

It was a hunter they had taken.

Jeno took a deep breath. It’d be fine. Kun knew what he was doing. Joohyun knew what she was doing. They weren’t in danger.

Jaemin wasn’t in danger. Renjun wasn’t in danger. Not this time, not again.

But he couldn’t swallow the feeling of helplessness that was bitter on his tongue again, as he un-bugged the website and sent it to his boss for revision.

What if the vampires’ plan wasn’t going to work?

 

[from Leleleeeeee, received 3:42 pm]  
“Hey Jen, how r u doing? Any news from Nana? Might drop by Kun-Ma’s, haven’t seen u in 2 long.”

[to Leleleeeeeee, sent 4:32 pm]  
“I’m fine. Tell me when you’re coming, so I’ll be there and fill you in.”

[from Leleleeeeee, received 4:33 pm]  
“K!! Maybeeee tmrw? Stay strong! He and Markie will be fine, I feel it! U kno I have a 7th sense.”

[to Leleleeeeeee, sent 4:41 pm]  
“You mean sixth?”

 

Jeno felt a little odd intruding Mark’s dorm again, but he had asked if Jeno could try again in getting some clothing, since Mina being in the room had ruined that plans last time, after Donghyuck had announced he wasn’t going anywhere she might be unless Mark bewitched him.

Mark’s bewitchment still lacked greatly, which puzzled the whole coven as it apparently was the easiest part of becoming a vampire.

“He’s too polite, I don’t feel like I really have to do this.” Johnny had explained, being the guinea pig for the newly turned vampires. If Johnny couldn’t be bewitched, Donghyuck most definitely wouldn’t comply either.

 

However, when he opened the lock with the combination Mark had given him, Jeno was surprised to find no one else but Donghyuck in the room, on the bed where Mina had sat last time he had come here. 

For a second, he froze on the threshold. Donghyuck was curled up, hick-upping, clearly upset. But it was too late to flee, because he had noticed Jeno and looked up, eyes shiny and blood-shot. 

Jeno stepped inside and closed the door, making sure no one would hear or see. 

“Hyuck…”

“Just go, it’s fine.” Donghyuck sniffed and buried his face in the pillow again. 

“No, it’s not.” Jeno softly said and stepped closer regardless, sitting down on the bed. Donghyuck felt very human under his hand, when he started rubbing his back. After spending all of yesterday evening with Jaemin and Renjun, he suddenly noticed the differences. 

“I don’t want to pull you down.” Donghyuck meekly answered.

“I don’t want you to cry all on your own in Mark’s dorm, though. This is more important.”

Donghyuck sobbed and Jeno’s heart sunk. 

“Thank you.”

“Do you want to talk?” Jeno wasn’t good with this, but Donghyuck usually took care of the talking and he only needed someone to listen. Jeno could do that for him. 

“I don’t know what to say. That never happens to me. I hate everything.” 

Jeno patted his back. What to do? He felt very out of place! Luckily, after a few more sniffles, Donghyuck sat up and wiped his tears away.

“I have to let go of my crush. It’s not good for me. I texted Mina, just… to be a decent human being. And she’s actually really sweet, but I’m so eaten by jealousy I can’t bring myself to accept that. I’m the worst best friend and I don’t want to be.”

“Okay. That sounds like a reasonable plan?”

“Yeah. I… I just don’t know how to do it. Whenever I see him, I just… urgh, I just feel butterflies again all over and want to cling to this sliver of hope. But he doesn’t even get it. It’s so stupid.”

“Maybe… maybe you should tell him? And that you’re planning to get over it, but… just for the meanwhile?” 

Donghyuck immediately shook his head. “I can’t. That’d make it weird, so weird, he’d probably want to accommodate or something. I can’t do that. I thought maybe… maybe if I… you know…” Donghyuck gestured wildly. Jeno did not know. “Maybe do something with someone else? It might help.”

“Do something? You mean go on a date with someone, or sleep with someone?” Jeno raised an eyebrow.

Donghyuck didn’t meet his eyes. “I mean, dating is sort of difficult with a society so homophobic, if you’re not really trying very hard, or just fall in love with your best friend, but I thought maybe just… sex?”

“And finding someone for that is easier? But what if it’s a bad person, someone who’ll take advantage of you? Not to mention… it’s not just sex. For some people it might be, but it’s really… you’re opening to that person in a way that’s hard to describe. You haven’t even had sex yet, have you? You might end up getting hurt even worse.”

Donghyuck looked at Jeno like he didn’t want to hear this, but Jeno knew he had to tell him. 

“Maybe I should just go away for some time. Get distance.” Donghyuck pressed the heels of his palms to his eyes. “Why is this so hard? Why can’t I just… fall in love with a guy who’s actually interested in cute, smart, witty, and adorable guys?”

Jeno felt helpless. He was sure there were plenty of people out there who’d love to have Donghyuck by their side. But hearing that wouldn’t help him now, because Jeno didn’t know where to find these people. There was only so much words could do to convince your heart.

Jeno knew that all too well.

“I just need to cry some more. Does your boyfriend mind when I cuddle you?”

“No, I don’t think they mind.”

“They… oh fuck off, I hate you and your perfect romance, you were supposed to suffer with me after Renjun turned you down!” Donghyuck whined, but pulled Jeno closer regardless and lowered his voice, sounding more genuine to add: “You’re really cute together, congrats.”

 

On Wednesday, Renjun suggested skipping their last classes to visit Jaemin. 

“He’s been sending me nothing but whiney texts for three hours.” Renjun poked their overcooked cafeteria-vegetables with their chopsticks, like that’d make them any more edible.

“Oh yes, me, too, that sometimes happens. He’s a little needy.” Something felt different today, but Jeno wasn’t sure how to pin-point it, it was in how Renjun held their chopsticks and cocked their head… maybe it was due to Jaemin’s texts? 

“Well, I’ll ditch my last two classes, the teacher’s only revising some public cases anyway, and I can do that with one of the vampires instead. That shit has been taught since the beginning of time, I’m sure Kun knows it better than my professor. Are you coming?”

Jeno’s heart did a small summersault in his chest. “Of course!”

“Good. By the way, did you talk to Hyuck recently? He ditched me for the morning tutoring and hasn’t answered my texts since 11 am.”

Heartbreak seemed to hit him worse than anticipated. Jeno felt bad for not being able to do more for him yesterday.

“I saw him yesterday, he was pretty down because of the whole… Mark situation. He said he made the resolution to get over him, but he doesn’t know how.”

Renjun sighed “He told me.” They tapped their fingers to their phone. Something definitely was off, just what? “I really wish there was some way to take off the pain of him, but he’ll have to get through that, no matter how much it sucks. Did you know that Lucas flirted with him?” Renjun looked up. 

Jeno shivered “Lucas? But he’s with Dongyoung, that’s like… no, oh my god, Nana joked about asking them to go out with him before, that’s like he’s dating your aunt or something!”

Renjun laughed “Dongyoung’s your uncle now?”

“I don’t know, it’s just… weird. Wrong.”

“Anyway, I told him that sleeping with Lucas won’t help him at all.”

“Good lord, that’s what he meant yesterday? I should have been even more firm with telling him to not do that!” Jeno gasped. 

Lucas isolated from his boyfriend surely fit very well with Donghyuck, they were both loud but extremely caring at their core. Since Dongyoung, Lucas, and Jungwoo had an open relationship it also wasn’t a problem in that sense. 

Having Dongyoung in the mix just completely ruined the idea for Jeno. It was like your friend dating your aunt, how Luke and Leia’s kisses immediately became extremely uncomfortable the moment he learnt they were twins.

“I’m glad you agree. Are you finishing that?” Renjun gestured to Jeno’s sad lunch.

“Nah, it’s awful, I think the cooks want us to leave for the semester break already.”

“Same.” Renjun got up and took their tray to return it. 

 

As they left the campus and headed for the subway, Renjun stuck closer to Jeno than they normally would have, even more so than yesterday. It felt good, especially when Jeno could make sure the way was clear for them. Surprisingly, Renjun let him, instead of marching ahead. Jeno enjoyed himself more than he maybe should. But if he couldn’t take the role of the guard of their triple, he’d at least live out his gentleman-fantasies in the urban jungle of Seoul.

 

Sicheng was in the living room, lying on the sofa, when they entered, while Yuta’s cursing could be heard.

“Hi!” the Chinese waved with a beam.

Jeno eyed Yuta in worry, who was obviously fighting a losing battle with the DVD-Player.

“Do you need help there?” Jeno offered. When there was Netflix, who even used DVD players anymore? He didn’t dare voice that thought.

The older vampires were… well, like your parents or grandparents with technology, most of them anyway. Kun wasn’t terrible, because he was patient, Yangyang was sort of okay, while Ten was a completely lost case and everyone was glad he was dating Johnny, who was both human and up to date with touch screens, text messages, and similar witchcraft. 

Yuta in particular was notorious for breaking his phones because he didn’t understand the concept of them being 1) fragile and 2) sensitive, which made throwing or washing them under running water not that brilliant of ideas.

“Yes, please.” Yuta groaned and sat back.

Sicheng and Renjun fell into chatter, that Jeno didn’t understand and didn’t have time to listen to, but he noticed Renjun’s voice pitching higher as they switched languages. It sounded so cute, but they didn’t normally do that, so why today....?

With a few presses of buttons, the DVD player complied with him and the title screen of what looked like Pretty Cure in a more recent instalment appeared on their TV.

“Thank you Jeno, I owe you.” Yuta sighed and flopped on to the sofa next to Sicheng. 

 

Jaemin was easily found in the kitchen. Mark was lying on the kitchen table, eyes red and half closed, a fang digging into his lower lip while Jaemin was stirring something… brown.

“Jen! Injunie!” Jaemin squeaked and left his questionable potion on the counter. Mark rose his head and waved tiredly, while Jaemin tried to kiss Renjun, who escaped him with a yelp and went into hiding behind Jeno, who ended up with a slobbery cheek. Mark was nice enough to avert his eyes while their boyfriend was ignoring social norms for the display of intimacy in front of other people. 

“What on earth is that?” Renjun crept to the counter and inspected the… whatever it was.

“I tried blending burger, Lucas helped me, but it’s much harder than I expected it to be. Want to try?”

“N-no thanks.” Renjun backed away, their hands held up. Jeno eyed them. Something was different today…

“I don’t recommend it, it tastes absolutely god-awful. Food’s officially ruined.” Mark announced, not bothering it lift his head up. Clearly, both him and Donghyuck were obviously struggling, but for entirely different reasons. 

Jeno hated seeing it. Ideally, they should be there for each other, have their backs. But in Donghyuck’s situation that wouldn’t help him right now, and from how long the heart-break had been coming, Jeno would rather have Mark make do with someone that wasn’t his best friend to comfort him, than have Donghyuck push himself right back into a situation clearly not helping him mentally.

“Well, yeah. Maybe Lucas’ll drink it, or Dejun, he has the weirdest taste, he eats chilli paste straight from the glass, too.” Jaemin shuddered. That sounded rather… questionable. 

 

Jaemin had been permanently assigned to the guest room, while Mark currently lived in what used to be Kun’s room, who had just moved his belongings to the next one, where his boyfriend lived. 

“What’re your pronouns today?” Jaemin asked the second the door closed. Jeno stared at him, then at Renjun. Then, he slapped his hand to his forehead. 

Why hadn’t he asked that?

“Uh… she.” Renjun replied and Jeno slapped his forehead again. “Jen, what are you doing? You won’t grow brain-cells back, you realise that?”

“I feel so stupid.” Jeno muttered “I thought something was off, but I… I’m so sorry, I should have asked you, too, I’m really sorry! I’m the worst boyfriend and it’s only been one day.”

Someone took his hand, then someone else took his other. 

“It’s fine, Jen, we weren’t even anywhere you could have used them and you didn’t misgender me.”

“Not to mention, that’s why Renjun has two boyfriends, so we can remind each other when we’re being dumb fools again.” Jaemin grinned and pressed a kiss to his knuckles. 

Jeno sighed deeply. Somehow Jaemin and Renjun managed to make him feel 100% better in just two simple sentences. 

“I really feel like boo boo the fool.” 

“That’s okay, I’m predestined for the role of the smart boyfriend.” Jaemin nodded.

“You’re such an idiot.” Jeno laughed and pushed him a little. Too bad Jaemin felt like a rock under his hands, not even budging. It shouldn’t be so hot, but it really was, and Jeno knew Jaemin could heart his heartbeat pick up but there was no way of stopping it. He evaded the vampire’s smirk by staring at the wall, and was luckily saved from his misery quickly.

“Well, since we ditched classes to see you, I hope you used the day well, how’s red-state? Mark didn’t look very happy in the kitchen, how’re you holding up?” Renjun asked, hopping over to sit on the bed, bouncing her legs up and down. Jeno and Jaemin had the same thought, but Jaemin moved much quicker than Jeno and dove onto the bed to wrap himself around Renjun, who screeched in surprise. 

Jeno had some major complaints around the whole being with two supernatural creatures thing, but as he shuffled over, Jaemin found himself fought off and pushed aside, and a huffing Renjun climbed over him.

“Well, look? No red-state!” Jaemin croaked. 

“Well, I guess that’s good progress then.” She muttered and her voice was a little higher in how she talked in Korean now, too, just how she had spoken to Sicheng earlier. Just like the red eyes, it was something new, but just like the red eyes he found himself not minding it. On the contrary. He hoped that Renjun could feel comfortable enough around them to allow herself to completely be herself.

“I’m literally a perfect pupil!” Jaemin whined “Jeno, please praise me!”

Jeno laughed and dropped onto the bed where Jaemin was looking like a kicked puppy. Just for fun, he reached out and petted his head how one would with a dog “Good job, Nana! Such a good boy.”

The words had just left his lips, when Jeno was toppled over and his wrists were fixed to the bed, Jaemin hovering an inch over his face, smirking down. 

“Who’s the good boy, hm?” he whispered. 

Despite some of his blood busy rushing south, Jeno’s brain was still fully functional and today, he had this… feeling of needing to impress Renjun. Just because they were officially dating now didn’t mean that he’d just take her for granted.

Too bad that Renjun had gotten up and was currently surfing the Netflix recommendations on the smart TV.

Jaemin apparently had followed his gaze and found Renjun not paying them attention, too. So, he settled for a peck and scrambled off Jeno.

“Are you done?” Renjun asked, having settled for “Back to the Future”. 

“Yes.” Jaemin snaked his body around Renjun and nuzzled his cheek against hers.

 

Lying on you boyfriend’s bed and watching TV while trying to figure out how to subtly kiss your other significant other until she got mad because she was missing the plot, and then make out with your boyfriend to get over the heart-break of being denied was about 20 times as awesome as Jeno’s Java class. 

The only downside was the stiff neck he got from having to hold himself up and over Renjun’s back as Jaemin licked into his mouth and let his hands wander over Jeno’s body. 

That was until Renjun and Jaemin perked up during the slightly weird scene between Marty and his mother – again, just how Jeno felt when someone suggested dating one of Dongyoung’s boyfriends.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, looking around.

“There’s people yelling at each other in the living room.” Jaemin whispered, obviously straining to listen in. No wonder Jeno couldn’t hear, if he was already struggling. 

“Should we check?” Renjun asked. 

Jeno turned off the TV.

“Yeah, I think we should.” Jaemin nodded, and they scrambled off the bed and out the door.

There was already a small crowd building in the living room, and Jeno spotted Kun and Ten being the centre of the argument, Ten held back by Yuta and Yangyang, who were visibly straining to keep him down. Ten was older than them by quite a bit from what Jeno knew, so he was probably a lot stronger, too.

“Ten, I’m worried too, but you know what happened last time: you went on a suicide mission. I cannot let you do that, not with something on this scale, this isn’t some young vampires running wild in a mall, this is organised crime, messing with the Hunting union.”

“I don’t care! They have Johnny!” Ten snarled, but a tear was running down his cheek and Jeno felt his blood run cold. He had never seen Ten cry, not even during sad movies or their graduation when Kun had totally not cried either (But he really had an they all knew it).

“Who has Johnny?” Jaehyun cut in, voice surprisingly hard. 

“Those rebels or whatever. Check the news, the whole head quarters are under lock-down because they were overrun by a wave of vampires and wolves who took about 50 hostages before they disappeared into thin air.” Kunhang crossed his arms. 

Jeno shuddered. 

“We cannot act on our own. Joohyun’s already called for a leader meeting, we’ll follow along with what her plan is, anything else is much too dangerous.” Kun said and Ten growled. 

“Is there anything we can do?” Dongyoung asked, but Kun shook his head. 

“I’ll call everyone to come back, and ask you to please wait here until I return or tell you what the plan of action is. Ten, I know this is hard, but think about it reasonably for a second here. It’s a suicide mission and you know that. You won’t get him, and if worst comes to worst, you’ll leave your life. It won’t help.”

Ten cried out in frustration, but then he went slack between the other two, his head hanging low.

Wait. Hostages, hunters, overrun, rebellion…

“Renjun, did Hyuck answer your texts?” Jeno urged.

“Hm? No.” She shook her head, but realisation dawned on it only a second later. “Fuck.”

“You think they have Donghyuck as well?” Kun asked, face set in a serious scowl. 

Jeno’s head spun. It had been odd that Donghyuck hadn’t been targeted, when he had. Donghyuck had trained for a lot longer, after all. But maybe it had all been part of a more elaborate plan?

“Alright. We’ll figure it out. We’ll do everything in our power to get them back.” Kun looked at Ten, who wasn’t looking back “All of them.”

 

The second Kun was gone, Jeno expected chaos to break lose. But it didn’t. Mark looked white as the wall and his eyes had this red hue to them that didn’t seem to want to leave, but Ten let Yuta sit him down on the sofa where he curled up and didn’t move, while everyone else seemed to mentally ready themselves for… well, battle. 

Jeno tried to gain energy from that and follow along this mindset of determination rather than panic. He wasn’t even sure they’d let him come with them, but he didn’t want to stay behind. 

“Jaemin, do you know how to protect yourself?” Dongyoung suddenly was next to them, raising his eyebrows at Jaemin, who had been playing with the sleeve of Renjun’s shirt. 

“Me?” Jaemin looked around.

“No, the other Jaemin.” Dongyoung teased.

“Uh… I can… kick?” Jaemin suggested. 

Jeno masked his laugh with a cough.

“No matter what we’ll do, there’s always the chance of a fight breaking out and you having to defend yourself. Jeno, can you step up for a second?” Jeno pulled away and stood in a free spot. 

They had often trained duelling together, Dongyoung giving them tips for how to go about it. So, when he charged at Jeno, he immediately knew how to move to block and disable him.

It was an easy grip, but it felt good to use it and get through with it, instead of being met with a concrete wall and ending up being helpless.

“Like this?” Dongyoung asked, while Jeno held his hands down. He knew he hadn’t really used his true strength of Jeno wouldn’t have lasted a second, but to be able to successfully defeat him gave Jeno a push of confidence he definitely needed.

“That was so hot.” Jaemin whispered. “I mean… no? I only ever did dancing.” 

 

After 15 minutes, everyone of the coven had arrived home. They kept staring at the tv, taking in all the news from the woman standing in front of HQ and retelling the same story over and over, but no new information was added, leaving them with barely half the story.

After 30 minutes, there was finally the call from Kun.

“We’re going to go to the Hunters’ headquarters. All covens and nearly all packs of Seoul. We’ll tell them we want to help.” Kun’s voice was tinny over the line. 

“All covens and all packs? That’s thousands of people, are you insane?” Yuta asked.

“To the headquarters? Right into their arms? Isn’t that… risky?” Dongyoung chipped in.

“There’s how many registered hunters in Seoul?” Kun returned.

“5,000.” 

“And there’s about 10,000 of us. They’ll be outnumbered, not to mention at the disadvantage. We want to show them we don’t have malicious intent. We don’t have much of a choice. Chances are, they’re already planning a purge. We have to either stop them before they can make their move or take them all out, basically following through with the rebels’ plan by unbalancing power in South Korea and maybe even triggering worse if the International Union steps in. Which actually might even be these peoples’ plan. We won’t let them make us their puppets. Please mask your faces.”

The call ended and Jeno looked around at faces varying from determination to doubt. 

“Alright, you heard it. Maybe today is the day we can finally make peace with the Hunters, wouldn’t that be a truly historic event?” Jaehyun loudly asked, and the coven broke into action. 

Yes. They’d make peace, find the rebels and bring them down, freeing Donghyuck and Johnny from wherever they were held up. Definitely a day to remember for generations to come.

If it worked and not all of them ended up with wooden bullets and stakes in their hearts before even uttering a single word of their plan.

“Jeno? Are you okay if I hide in your sweater? I don’t want anyone to see me, but I want to come.” Renjun asked, lacing her fingers into Jeno’s. 

“Of course.”

“Okay. Thank you. I… I’m sure everything will work out.” Renjun quickly pressed a kiss to Jeno’s cheek that made him blush, before she shrunk into the speck of light he had seen many times before and settled in the folds of his hood. 

He had Renjun with him and a whole coven of Vampires to keep him safe. It’d be fine, Jeno repeatedly told himself. 

“Hey. I’ll protect you, too.” Jaemin whispered as they all slipped into shoes and jackets.

“Thank you.” Jeno whispered. And he meant it.

 

But how well would Jaemin be able to do so? 

 

And how would they get Donghyuck and Johnny back?

And in what state?

 

Jeno couldn’t help thinking there were a lot of huge holes leaving room for failure. Massive failure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [ CuriousCat](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)


	8. Chapter 8

The Hunter Union’s headquarters’ high-rise building seemed threatening and daunting today, the reflective windows showing the group of people marching towards it like an army of doom. 

Cameras were on them, people nervously talking where they made space for the women and men leading the masses. Jeno kept glancing around, kept trying to evade the cameras of the people lingering and those of the news agencies that had been on site to report on the “act of terrorism”.

His face was hidden behind a black mask, the same type everyone else was wearing, and it helped him hide his insecurities and fears, blend into the people around him who were no doubt several times as strong and as experienced as him. 

Kun and his coven were walking far in the front, just behind Joohyun and a few of the pack leaders of Seoul’s werewolf population. Naturally, he was with them. Jeno knew he might have to talk to people here, which didn’t help soothe the nervousness whatsoever. 

The front doors were sealed with police band, but Joohyun easily ripped through it and Jeno saw the guards who tried to step in become mindless puppets under Sooyoung and Seulgi’s glances.

He looked down the street, but with 8,000 people it was impossible to see the end of the line. Not everyone had come. The werewolves had children, after all, those had no place in battle. To think this wasn’t even the whole supernatural population was impressive. Then again, compared to the humans living in the city it was nothing, maybe 0,1%.

Dongyoung was telling Joohyun directions, leading her to the big meeting room on the top floor. No doubt that was where all the people pulling the strings were right now, discussion how to address the threat. 

Jeno saw people in the blue Uniform with the 四 (four) stitched over their chests notice them and start arguing, but no one dared step into the way of this never-ending stream of people that started ascending the stairs.

Jeno didn’t trust it’d be that easy. 

Every time a new person in the uniform appeared in one of the doors of a new floor they reached, he tensed, expecting them to finally do something. But none of them did, they only argued and watched. Maybe he underestimated the power that came in numbers, as part of the mob it was hard to judge just how intimidating they appeared.

However, they hadn’t done absolutely nothing, because word had obviously spread quicker than them thanks to modern technology. When Joohyun and Seulgi pushed open the door to the meeting room, people were already standing, guns at the ready, pointed at them. 

“Hands up, we’re going to shoot, tell your names and your intent, monsters!”

Jeno’s breath caught in his neck.

Had Joohyun prepared for that? Many of the leaders were right in the front, the most vulnerable people. Not that anyone’s death was justifiable, but if the leaders went down first, chaos would follow, no doubt.

What if she hadn’t? What if no one had expected this? 

There were only seconds to act, maybe even that would be too late, but Jeno couldn’t stand and watch this.

Not when he could maybe stop it!

He let go of Jaemin, pushed past Jaehyun and Taeyong, past Sooyoung and Joohyun and ripped the mask off his face, standing in front of them in the door, the first target that’d get hit, rather than the Hunters being able to rip right into their lines by taking out vampire after vampire, that’d just fall to ashes and reveal the next line behind them. 

There was a codex the Union acted according to. And high on that list was:

Never kill a human.

“Jeno!” he heard someone hiss behind himself, maybe Kun.

“Lee Jeno?” Jeno glanced to where one of his former trainers jumped off his chair. 

“I’m human, you cannot shoot me.” He said, his voice surprisingly steady for how nervous he was. “Please, listen to us.”

There was a beat of silence, no one moved, not one spoke, it was just about 50 peoples’ gun barrels directed at Jeno, who stood in front of 8,000 supernatural beings with his arms spread wide to make himself the target.

If this went south, it’d be if for him. There was no way to survive their bullets. If they didn’t believe him, or didn’t want to, there was nothing he could do. If he heard a trigger, it’d already be too late, he wasn’t faster than a bullet.

Then, Jeno suddenly heard a soft buzzing sound. Something tickled against his neck, hidden from the hunters, but there.

Renjun! 

Jeno felt new determination in his muscles, felt himself refocus on his goal as the fear slowly ebbed off and left him standing taller.

“I always knew it. He and that other Lee kid, with their ridiculous claims that vampires are misunderstood.” Someone barked, breaking the quiet.

“We don’t have time for these stupid discussions now.”

“What else do you plan on doing, you can’t harm him?”

“Someone, drag him aside.”

“I’ll happily take all these monsters out with my own two hands.” People were yelling all over each other and Jeno got ready to punch some higher ups if they actually tried to move him.

“Gentlemen, please, no brash and stupid moves. There’s currently far more than 5,000 of us in this building. We don’t intend to harm you, but if you shoot first, we’ll be very quick to take those few hunters in the building out. No union without hunters, is there?” Joohyun’s voice was pleasant, but her words were absolutely unmistakable in what they were: a threat. 

Jeno hadn’t expected her to so openly black mail them, but it was a situation that called for any means necessary. 

“Your plan is to take us out, isn’t it? You were very clear in that.” Jeno recognised the head of the Union, who came closer. He didn’t have a weapon in hand, but that didn’t mean he was harmless. He hadn’t gotten there by watering his flowers. 

“It’s not our plan. We unfortunately missed the rise of whatever fools made that rebellion. We’re here to work together with you. We have a common enemy, don’t we? We just want to live in Seoul peacefully, police can be quite useful in that, after all there’s criminals wherever you go, be it among humans or vampires. We don’t mean any harm – as long as you don’t. Let’s find those pests that threaten both our existences and take them out. After that, we can go back to hating each other, if you insist on that.”

Joohyun’s words were alluring, reasonable, and sounded perfectly practiced to convince someone even without bewitchment. 

“And how do I know how to trust you?”

“Well, we haven’t killed each and every last person in the building yet, when we very well could have, have we now? We’ve been very patiently tolerating your presence.” Jeno knew Joohyun was stretching it. But the head of the Union didn’t, because he paled. 

“Don’t… don’t be ridiculous. We can wipe out your entire population within only one night. We’ve done it before and we will do it again!”

Jeno hoped he was joking, because that was literally their worst fear: a strike by the Union. Apparently, that had been exactly what they had been planning on. Would this still stop them? Or were they maybe just provoking them more? 

Had this been a mistake after all? What would happen to him, now that they knew he was with the vampires and werewolves?

“That’s cute. I won’t deny you got a lot of us, but all supernatural life? Please, we simply relocated.” Someone behind Jeno said, the Busan dialect lacing his words unmistakable. He dared to glance over his shoulder to see who had just spoken. His face was hidden, of course, but he was tall, big eyes staring back at the director angrily. Jeno wasn’t sure, but he suspected him to be one of the pack leaders that had been walking in the front with them.

“What do you want?” the director asked. He was wavering, it was obvious in his body language, face, and voice. Surely, he was very well aware Joohyun’s people were everywhere in the building, they clearly had communicated before Jeno and the others had arrived up here.

“Like I said, we want to take those rebels out. They have a few of our people, we’re missing some wolves and some friends. Let’s work together and find them. In turn, you’ll leave each pack and coven helping alone.” Joohyun coldly demanded.

“We don’t even know your faces.”

“Yes, how can we know you’re trustworthy?”

“Maybe you’re tricking us.”

“Like I said, if we wanted to, we could have long taken your little club out. But we haven’t. We even took in some of your members.”

The table of high ups quieted, as they obviously tried to piece together who she was talking about.

“Jeno’s never been initiated, not to mention he was always… ambivalent.” Someone chipped in.

Someone stepped next to Jeno and he glanced over to see it was Dongyoung, who was taking off his mask. 

“Hi. It’s me.” 

The effect was immediate and much grander than Jeno’s own reveal, people were talking over each, some pointing fingers at them.

Dongyoung had been a top trainee and hunter in his age group, always on top of lists and rankings, meaning most people knew him. 

He had been a collateral during the internal conflict the former ruling coven had struggled with two years ago, turned and dumped in front of the Head Quarters as a present. Back then, it hadn’t been the goal to take out the Hunters, but to get them on the track of those covens opposing the traitor from their own lines. One Hunter getting harmed wouldn’t be reason to flip. It just happened, a risk that came with the job.

Much more worrisome to the Union had been Dongyoung’s disappearance. To this day, the technicalities of his break-out were the reason for sleepless nights for some Hunters, because no one really knew what happened.

Jeno knew. He had been the one hacking the CCTV, after all. He had seen that it had been Ten kicking in the massive steel door and dragging Dongyoung out of the cell he had been kept in.

The official explanation had been that it was the same vampire that had been deemed responsible for everything else going on, but security had been reinforced since, the dented door giving them a hint of what a vampire could do.

“Quiet!” the head of the Union bellowed and the voices immediately died. “We’ll work together with you and accept the condition of not harming anyone involved, only for the time investigations last. In turn, we don’t want any of our hunters bewitched, drunken from, or killed.”

“Deal.” Joohyun held out her hand and the man shook it.

 

“That was both the bravest and the scariest thing I’ve ever seen you do.” Jaemin whispered. There were tears shining in his eyes. 

“Sorry. But I had Renjun there with me. She wouldn’t have let anything happen.” Jeno assured his boyfriend, who nodded. 

But he couldn’t stop himself from shaking, now that he no longer stood in the first line but was on the carpet of an office. Too many emotions were coursing through him, fear, relief, anger, and more fear.

Even Jaemin holding his hand and never letting go, and Renjun sitting on top of his knuckles didn’t help it go away.

The Union was preparing to strike, but of course the wolves and vampires wanted to get a say in that now, so the leaders had remained in the meeting hall upstairs, while all the other members were spread around the headquarters, waiting in offices where Hunters were glaring at them or asking questions. 

Of course, all were instructed to under no circumstances give away how to make the union’s lives easier, but conversations could actually be quite beneficial to them. If the Hunters realised they didn’t pose a threat, they’d reconsider once this was over. 

Many had lost someone dear to them, like Jeno, through vampire or werewolf attacks. He assumed those staying away had suffered a loss like that, thus making them more hostile. It was understandable, he would have done the same a few years ago, when he had had this idea that vampires were the reason for all his misery, inherently evil, only waiting to take his blood and leave his body to bleed out after. 

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that it had, once more, been Donghyuck that changed his mind. He, too, had lost his parents, but generally was easier to give people a second chance, except when they were his crush’s girlfriends. 

It felt like yesterday when the news had been delivered that Dongyoung had been turned, found, and arrested. It had spread like wildfire in the office and training facilities. Jeno remembered not wanting to believe that one of his mentors and favourite older-brother-figures had been made a monster and held in the Hunter Unions’ prisons.

He remembered crying and wishing he could turn back time and undo it, warn him, anything, to keep him from becoming a vampire, until Donghyuck said he happened to know a few people who could help and that not all hope was lost. 

Needless to say, Jeno didn’t really question it, as he hacked himself into the security system of the cameras – completely illegal, of course, but no one had found out to this day. 

The people that could help were actually vampires Donghyuck knew, because that was a very Donghyuck-thing to do. One of them was no other than their dance instructor of that time, Ten, who was completely unsuspicious, except maybe his him complete and utter incompetence regarding the Stereo in the practice room and his tendency to bring CDs, rather than just connect his phone. 

Not only had they broken Dongyoung out of there, they had taken him in and helped him, and Jeno had eventually found out that he hadn’t really changed at all. It was just like Jaemin now, some red-eyes-and-fangs situations, no heartbeat, but still the same person inside. 

“So, do you think we’ll do something today?” Mark flopped down on the ground next to them. 

“My guess is as good as yours.” Jeno pulled Mark’s mask up where it had slipped. They were still hoping to somehow wiggle the two past the Union’s watchful eye. It wasn’t very likely they’d suddenly be their best friends once this was over. Dongyoung was on their list already, so it couldn’t be helped. Jaemin and Mark weren’t, so it was better to protect their identities.

“But… we should. Any hour counts. They might not even want to get information from Johnny and Hyuck, and whoever else they took.”

“Mark, the same that goes for Ten goes for you, too.” Jaemin sternly reminded him.

“I know just… this is the worst! It’s only been a few days since I didn’t know where he was, if he was in danger, hurt, anything.” Mark tugged on his own hair in frustration. “Now he’s god knows where again! Not to mention Johnny. Him! How could they get him! He’s a skilled hunter, but no longer being in active duty, he doesn’t deserve it at all!”

“You know how strong these guys are.” Jeno tried to sooth, but there now were tears in Mark’s eyes and that hardly ever happened. 

A small speck of light hopped from Jeno’s hand over to Mark’s, who looked down in surprise. Jaemin moved to sit closer and block any other peoples’ view, as Renjun settled on his shoulder, in a show of silent support for her friend. 

“We will find them! There’s the force of the covens and packs of Seoul combined with the Hunting Union. We will succeed.” Jeno insisted. Party to convince himself, partly, because he genuinely thought so.

“Ah, there you are, I thought I had lost you, too.” The looked up and saw a small group of Taeil, Taeyong, Jaehyun, and Ten come closer.

“Why lost us, too?”

“Well, Dejun, Kunhang, Sicheng, and Yangyang are with their Chinese friends, Yuta went to look for some wolf-kids he apparently knows, and Jungwoo found this guy from Junmyeon’s pack he tried to get into the pants of for months now, so he’s doing small-talk, and Dongyoung took Lucas with him to go to the lost-and-found office in hopes of recovering some of his belongings from his old desk.” Taeil pushed Ten onto the floor, who looked like a zombie, no smile, no energy, just letting the younger move him around wherever he wanted. Jeno swallowed. That wasn’t the Ten he knew!

Jaehyun and Taeyong flopped down next to them.

“Wait, is that Renjun?” Jaehyun narrowed his eyes at Mark.

“Oh, yes, it is.” Jeno nodded, a small smiled tugging on his lips. 

“I didn’t know he came!” Taeyong beamed. 

She.

It was she.

Jeno felt the wrong pronoun irk him, but he bit his tongue. Renjun had asked them to not tell the others yet, so he couldn’t correct Taeyong. 

Renjun seemed to move, because there were some sparkles flying. Jeno’s eyes got stuck on her, his heart swelling in his chest. She was just so adorable, even as a tiny speck of light!

“So, guys, do you know what they’re planning?” Mark asked. He was bounding his knee up and down now in nervousness. 

“No. My guess is as good as yours, but if we can stop the Union just from attacking us tonight that’s a big win in my books.” Taeyong explained. 

“Knowing them… we’ll take a few more days to look and check and see, until everything is sure, before anything happens.” Ten said. He didn’t even look up, his voice void of emotion.

“Tennie, you know we cannot risk it! They have to be really super extra sure, so we keep our chances of survival and success as high as possible.” Taeyong softly explained, rubbing Ten’s back. 

“I know.”

Jeno’s heart sunk at the soft words. 

 

Time stretched on as they waited. They got involved into some small talk with some Hunters, who kept giving Jeno weird side glances and asked overall rather rude questions. Eventually, Dongyoung and Lucas returned with a stack of things the former used to keep on his desk, and slowly, the whole coven started returning and waiting together for Kun’s return.

Rather than that, the speakers over they head cracked. Jeno startled so badly he bumped into Jaemin. Again, his boyfriend didn’t even budge, it was like hitting a rock, but Jeno right now felt very grateful for having this rock to cling onto.

“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.” It was Joohyun’s voice and Jeno immediately saw confusion in the Hunters around them, who had missed what had happened and wouldn’t know who this was. 

“As you might know, the Union has kindly decided to work together with us in order to fight back against the rebellion currently happening and planning to take down not only the Hunters, but essentially the whole government of South Korea, which is not a common goal we share. The following rules apply for our cooperation: all vampires and werewolves are granted anonymity, meaning face masks and no revelation of names, while all humans are guaranteed not to be bewitched or drunken from. Both parties will not cause any harm on each other. 

“I’m looking forward to working together.”

There was some shuffling going on, then the voice of the president followed Joohyun up.

“You heard her, those rules have been agreed on only until we manage to take out the threat. We’ll be working together with the other Union’s offices to find their hide-out and take them out in good old manner. All missing Hunters will have to be kept alive, turned or not, until we agree on what will happen to them in a negation after.

“For smooth exchange, there’ll be vampires and werewolves helping us with the investigations in our offices from right now on.”

“Every coven leader and pack Alpha has decided upon which members they see fit for the task. Please come together in your covens and packs and wait for them to instruct you.” Joohyun explained. 

Jeno looked around and found people starting to flock into groups. 

Yuta came jogging down the hall, a Hunter jumping out of his way as if he was bringing the pest. Then again, Yuta was also on their list, so he was carelessly walking around without a mask, which apparently made him even more suspicious to the Hunters.

“You smell of wet dog.” Yangyang complained as he dropped himself on the ground next to them.

“Can’t be helped, they’re very cute wet dogs, though.”

“I don’t like the negative attitude toward other supernatural beings.” Dejun softly chided. 

“Well, I had someone call me blood sucker just an hour ago, so I’ll happily return the favour.”

“It’s not about being petty, it’s about being the bigger person.” Dejun explained. Jeno could see how he and Kun would fall in love, they clearly were on the same wave length. 

“Bigger person? That’s rich coming from you.” Yangyang cackled. 

“Said the one who only just made it to 1,70m.” Kunhang chipped in- The cackling vampire heard and grabbed his collar. 

“Hey! I was born in tough times, people didn’t grow that tall in 1805, so I’ll have you know my height is above average!”

Kunhang shrugged, looking bored “If you say so, at least something has to be bigger than average, right?” his gaze dropped down and up again, a smirk pulling on his lips. 

“Shut up, someone who chokes despite not having to breathe gets no say in these matters.” Yangyang yelled, shaking Kunhang.

Dejun scooted aside, sighing deeply. Then, he spotted Renjun, still on Mark’s shoulder, and while Jeno watched in fascination how Yangyang and Kunhang started throwing insults at each other while they faces slowly got closer and closer until they were nearly kissing, Dejun stuck up a conversation with tiny-Renjun.

“Why is it, that I already heard you up in the staircase?” Suddenly, Yangyang was ripped off Kunhang and held by the neck like a scolded puppy by Kun. “Can you for once not make a scene? People are staring!”

“He started it!” Yangyang struggled, but didn’t manage to break free. Kun simply dropped him next to Sicheng, who held him down when he tried to get back up.

“You heard her. I was allowed to send four of the coven.” Kun sat down and lowered his voice. “If it works with you, I would like to have Dongyoung, since he has the Hunter training, Sicheng, because he is a good strategist, and then Ten, can I trust you to work efficiently and not let your worries get the better of you?”

Ten sat up straight “Yes.”

“Don’t make me regret it, if we have to wipe up your ashes because you went on a solo-trip, we will bury them in a smoothie glass.”

A small smile ghosted over Ten’s lips, only for the blink of an eye.

“That won’t be necessary.”

“Good. Mark, I’m sorry, but your grip on your abilities isn’t strong enough yet. You can work from home just as much, as long as you remember that you still have to work on getting a grip on those first.”

Mark nodded, but his face was full of disappointment. 

“Everyone who’s not working with the Union can go home now.”

They slowly scrambled off the ground. Yuta and Sicheng whispered something, the latter stroking his fingers over the former’s arm carefully and reassuringly, an intimate moment that Jeno didn’t feel right watching. Dongyoung handed his belongings over to Jungwoo, and Kun spoke to Dejun. The only one not having anyone, was Ten, but it was clear that the relief over being able to do something was bigger than the grief right now.

 

Jeno felt dead tired by the time he reached the campus dorms. It was nearing 10 pm and he wished he could be like Renjun and have someone carry him around. He wasn’t even sure if she was still awake, after she had crawled back into his hood earlier. 

The lock beeped in confirmation and he pushed it open, but found the lights inside turned on. Jeno startled and nearly screeched, when someone swirled around on his desk chair to face him, arms crossed, expression dark. 

“So. You all lied to me.”

Jeno felt his blood run cold.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well....
> 
>  
> 
> [CuriousCat](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)


	9. Chapter 9

Mina held her phone up, a photo on the screen. It must be recent, maybe from twitter or a news outlet, taken when they had marched into the headquarters. For someone who didn’t know what to look for, the picture would only show a crowd of masked people, hiding under caps and hoods.

But Jeno knew what to look for and, apparently, so did Mina. Because he recognised himself, looking straight at the camera that had taken the snapshot. Jaemin was right next to him, much harder to recognise, and then there was Mark, in the process of putting his cap back on, leaving his face relatively visible. The red hue to his eyes was obvious, too, but maybe Mina at least hadn’t noticed that. 

“I’m surprised that out of everyone, Donghyuck was the one not with you. Then again, he hasn’t replied to me, so he probably knows, too, right? He’s been childhood friends with Mark, after all, he knows everything that I don’t.” her voice broke off into a sob and she dropped her hand holding the phone. “It’s really great being played the fool.”

“No. No that’s not it, I can explain.” Jeno stuttered.

“What? That you’re working for an illegal terrorist organisation? A mafia mob? What is this even, how did you even… such a sick and twisted plan, announcing yourselves missing when you’re the ones taking hostages. I read the article, it was quite clear what happened. And I… I believed and… spent so much time… god! I hate myself for being so oblivious! I should have trusted my mother not to waste my time and just forget about Mark.”

“Please, really, we’re not like that at all! Mark isn’t like that, he didn’t deceive you!”

“No? What else did he do? He’s clearly not in trouble, but instead of giving me a call, he’s kept quiet! That is lying in the purest form!” Mina’s voice started rising in volume as tears kept running down her cheeks “I was being called a liar for making him keep quiet about our very new relationship until I was sure, but this? This is a lie, no, this is betrayal!” she threw her phone at Jeno, who managed to catch it. 

“I swear, it’s not like that…” Jeno felt himself scramble for words, but Mina was closing in on him now. 

“I don’t need your excuses, I won’t believe them. Tell Mark he can go fuck himself, I never want to see his face again and he if he wants his clothes back, I’ll literally throw them on the street.”

“Mina, please listen to me.” Jeno panicked. He couldn’t go and tell Mark Mina had broken up with him over a misunderstanding. He’d be devastated. 

Mina grabbed her phone from Jeno’s hands.

“Jeno, please don’t make this harder.” She hick-upped “This is the worst feeling in the world, knowing the person you though you liked, maybe even loved, played you like the violin, not only him, his friends were in on it, too.”

“Mark can’t talk to you, because he’s a…” the word died on Jeno’s tongue, the bewitchment kicking in.

“It’s okay, I don’t even want to know what crimes he’s invested in, you are invested in. I’m sure I’ll be better off not knowing.”

And with these words, she slammed the door behind herself. 

Jeno slapped his hand over his face and groaned, dropping to the bed. 

“Hey.” The soft voice of Renjun announced she had turned back to regular size. He felt her hands on his and she pulled them off his face. There was some lingering sparkle on her hair, her clothes, even her skin. It looked beautiful, fit her so well.

“I fucked up, didn’t I?”

“No. You couldn’t have told her. You know the secret is important, especially now. She’s emotional, she might do something on a whim and neither of us could have stopped or bewitched her. She’ll have to talk to Mark. We’ll let him know and he can talk it through with someone from the coven and decide what to do.”

“Shit, why is all of this happening, I just wanted a peaceful college time.”

Renjun smiled and stroked her fingers over his cheeks.

“I can’t tell you. But… the good thing is, that it helped us figure this out, didn’t it?”

Jeno sighed, but when she sat down on his thighs, he thought that, yes, there weren’t only downsides to the whole mess he found himself in. 

For some reason, Renjun tasted of strawberries when he kissed her. Maybe it was the fairy thing. He’d have to keep an eye on that, do a field study or something. Maybe kiss her every time she grew back to normal size after becoming a speck of sparkles. For science.

“It feels weird without Nana.” Renjun decided after she pulled away. “I can literally hear him whine in the back of my head and I don’t have any telekinetic abilities.”

Jeno couldn’t stop himself from laughing at that. 

“It’s okay, we don’t have to do anything if you feel like he’s missing and that makes it feel wrong. I can actually imagine his voice, too, now that you mentioned it.”

“It’s not like I don’t like you, okay?”

“Okay. You did say you had a crush on me first, so I’m feeling pretty confident.” Jeno winked and Renjun blushed and playfully hit his arm. 

“Stop trying to be smooth.”

“I’m not trying, I am.”

“Maybe.”

Jeno grinned, feeling quite pleased with flustering his girlfriend, who was still blushing.

“Well, whatever. I’ll go to bed now.”

“No shower?” Jeno teased, running his hands over hair sides.

“No.” Renjun muttered, suddenly looking dejected. She was about to get up, but Jeno held her waist to keep her in place.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”

“No, it’s okay, you were just joking.”

“But I shouldn’t be joking about something that makes you uncomfortable, I didn’t think, that was stupid. I’m sorry.”

Renjun smiled softly. “Okay. Thank you. It’s not your fault I’m weird.”

“You’re not weird. You’re unique and interesting.” Jeno pecked her cheek and Renjun huffed. 

“You actually don’t care, right? That… about the girl part, right? You don’t just… pretend, because of Nana?”

“Hey, I feel offended!” Jeno whined and pulled her closer, hoping to push away all her insecurities “If this is still about the gay thing, then I’ll officially announce my pan- or bi-sexuality to everyone tomorrow. It’s just a label, something you can change when you realise it no longer describes what’s inside. I didn’t think I wanted a girlfriend when I was in high school, but now, I really want you, as a girlfriend and as a boyfriend, or as a significant other.”

“Okay.” Renjun softly nodded, looking relieved. There was some glitter in her eyebrow and Jeno’s eyes caught on it “I know it’s dumb, but… I get insecure.”

Jeno gently tilted her head and kissed her on the lips, once, twice, five times, until she finally relaxed and kissed back, holding onto Jeno’s shoulders to steady herself. 

 

When Jeno returned from his shower, because he felt filthy and didn’t want to go to sleep without one, Renjun was already fast asleep, and he took a quick picture of her to send to Jaemin.

[to: Nana ♥, sent 11:04 pm]

“She’s so cute.  
Btw major issue with Mina, she recognised Mark in some press pics, idk how, and she was devastated and broke up with him via me and Renjun, help?”

[from: Nana ♥, received 11:05 pm]

“Shit, no, what? How? Really? Why? Shit!  
I’m so jellyyyy TT TT why can’t I be w/ u?”

 

Jeno woke up because someone was poking his stomach. Repeatedly. He groaned and tried to wiggle away, but it wouldn’t stop. Who was this? Jaemin never woke him so rudely.

“I said wake up! Hello? Did you die?” 

It was Renjun’s voice and Jeno tried to get closer to it, but then realised he was already wrapped around them. So, he squeezed tighter. How nice. Now if Renjun could stop talking…

“Lee Jeno! Wake up!” 

Jeno startled. 

“Wha?”

Renjun glared up at him from the bed, looking a little squished and ruffled, but very cute and pretty. Wait. Why were they in the same bed?

“I thought I was going to either suffocate or have to free myself by shrinking and that’d mean sparkle everywhere.” Renjun snorted.

“You liked the sparkle yesterday, though.” Jeno muttered “It’s so cute, too.”

“Call it a stereotype, but I can tolerate the sparkle when I’m a girl.”

“Oh. He today, then?”

“Yep.” Renjun ruffled his hair and sat up. 

“Why are we in the same bed?” Jeno asked, still too sleepy to compute properly.

“Well, I thought you could tell me, because I don’t have a clue.”

“Oh.” Jeno realised they were in Renjun’s bed, meaning he had been the one inviting himself without asking. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay, it was sort of nice.” Renjun muttered. Jeno grinned and grabbed him for a morning kiss. 

 

An hour later, they were in Hoegi, in front of the house door with the unsuspicious name “Kim” on it. Yes, there were classes to attend, but there also was an ongoing investigation, Donghyuck and Johnny missing, Mark and Mina’s relationship in shambles, Ten stressed to the bone, and also, Jaemin had been whining that he missed them. 

However, to Jeno’s endless surprise, it was Chenle opening the door, beaming. 

“Oh, you here?” Panic sparked in Jeno’s gut. Chenle wasn’t supposed to know the vampire secret, but if he had dropped by unannounced, would Jaemin and Mark have had time to hide? What if he, too, had recognised them in press images?

“Hi Lele. Are you visiting?” Renjun asked, sounding a little nervous as well.

“Oh yes, I was planning on dropping by, but then I watched TV yesterday and the news caster showed the list of missing people and Dongyoung was on it, so I naturally worried and called him, but it turned out he wasn’t missing, so at first I assumed there had been a mistake, but when I came by, Nana was in the living room and all that didn’t quite add up. I mean, he tried to flee, which was a cute try, but not good enough for me.”

Jeno exchanged a look with Renjun.

“Anyway, I can’t believe I waltzed around in a coven of the word that can no longer be said in this context without even suspecting anything. Am I an idiot?”

“Well, the good news is: Jaemin also didn’t suspect anything.” Renjun announced as they passed Chenle and entered the flat. 

“I don’t feel reassured at all. Well, at least Jisung is the last one to find out. If at all. I hope he will, so I can make fun of him.”

“Did you come alone?”

“Yep.”

“And school?” Renjun asked.

“Sorry, I’m graduating next week, I don’t have to go anymore. By the way, what about university, hm?” Chenle smirked.

“Yah! Respect your elders!” Renjun slapped him up the head.

“Jeno! Injunie! I missed you!” Jaemin came through the door and flung himself at Jeno, who went down under the force of the impact. His defenceless state gave Jaemin the chance to plant a welcome kiss on his lips, which made Chenle giggle.

“Injunie, you, too!”

Jaemin scrambled off Jeno, who felt like he should just stay here, on the tiled floor in the entrance hall, while Renjun escaped with less trouble. 

“Wait, why are you trying to kiss Renjun? Aren’t you and Jeno dating? Did you break up?” Chenle asked, eyes wide in confusion.

Jaemin froze, as did Jeno. Chenle, very clearly, wasn’t part of the coven and thus not in on their relationship yet. Not only not in, but also not supposed to be in.

“No, they haven’t, they just expanded and now I have to deal with Nana’s needy ass, too.” Renjun explained, but the tint of pink on his cheeks gave away that he wasn’t as aloof as he was trying to come off as.

“Oh, so, like Dongyoung, Jungwoo, and Lucas?”

“Yes and no.” Jeno sighed, finally getting off the comfortable floor.

“I sure hope not, those three… are a mess.” Renjun snorted. 

“Hey, Dongyoung isn’t!” Jeno complained.

 

Unfortunately, even with combined efforts of running patrol in Seoul and any other city with a Hunting Union branch, combing the internet, and trying to find those mystery emails in their accounts, there was no lead. Not even a dust particle the rebellion had left anywhere, the CCTV footage showed where they went, but then it just broke off, leaving them clueless where the Hunters’ had been taken.

It was ridiculous, to think that over 200 people just disappeared.

“They must be hiding in plain sight.” Ten groaned, rubbing his eyes. There were dark circles under them. “We’re so close, I know it!”

“If we are, then we’ll get there without you.”

“You have to wake me up if you do.”

“We will. Go to sleep now.” Kun insisted. 

Ten unwillingly let himself be pushed through the living room. At this point, he had definitely been up for over 24 hours. But him working all night to find his boyfriend wasn’t the only drama. 

“I don’t get it. How… but why, why couldn’t you tell her it wasn’t like that.” Mark grabbed Jeno’s collar, pulling him closer “Why didn’t you tell me immediately? I have to see her, I have to explain.”

“No, Mark, you’re not going anywhere.” Kun grabbed him as he was about to dart out the door. 

“Please, I have to explain I didn’t betray her. She can’t break up with me over this, without even seeing me!”

“Guys, I know these are stressful times and everyone is stretched thin, but this secret isn’t yours to give away, there are rules we have to follow and one of them is to keep our existence as secret as possible.”

“I can bewitch her.”

Kun raised an eyebrow and Mark faltered.

“I hate this! I hate all of this! I didn’t want to become a vampire! I just wanted a quiet life, that’s why I retired from the Hunting Union, but I can’t seem to catch a break, can I?” Mark tried to rip free, but Kun had more than 400 years on him and held tight. Jeno felt his heart break a little as he watched Mark struggle and eventually just give up. 

Jaemin clung to his arm and Jeno wondered, if he was feeling the same. Mark sunk into the sofa, staring at the wall blankly. 

“I’ll go back to the Union’s HQ. If anything changes, I’ll let you know.” Kun said softly, before pushing past them into the entrance hall. 

“Can we go for a walk?” Jaemin whispered, still holding onto Jeno’s arm.

“Yeah. Maybe get some fresh air.” Jeno nodded. 

“Mark, come on, I’ll make you some tea, you’ll feel better.” Taeil sat down next to their friend, waving them away, telling them he was going to handle the situation. 

 

Jeno felt like they were trying to hide they had broken El Capone from prison with Jaemin wrapped up like a criminal in hiding between them. 

It’d help if they could hold hands, but they couldn’t, not in a public setting, none of them had the mind to deal with people giving them dirty glares or even approach them and tell them their behaviour was unnatural and disgusting. Not today.

“How did Chenle take it?” Renjun asked, sipping on his coffee. They had decided to go to a mall to escape the frosty January air. 

“Pretty well.” Jaemin muttered. His Starbucks had four extra shots of espresso that Jeno was sure wasn’t good for him, but at least he would no longer suffer from stomach damage. “He was mainly surprised and then angry with himself for not having noticed earlier. He said he should have been more suspicious the fridge was always off-limits.”

“That’s a relief then.” Jeno muttered. 

“Like Kun said, it’s supposed to be a secret, and it’s important to keep it that way.” Jaemin softly added, nudging Jeno’s shoulder. Of course, he had noticed that Jeno still felt guilty about it.

“Let’s just forget about all that mess for now, okay? We can’t even do anything, it’s in the hands of the professionals.” Renjun suggested. Jeno found himself nodding. He really needed a break from worrying over Donghyuck, over Johnny, over Mark, over Ten, over Mina, over everyone. 

“We should go shopping!” Jaemin suggested, spreading his arms to draw attention to the countless shops they were currently strolling past. 

“What for, though?” Renjun asked. 

“How about some sexy-urgh.” Jeno had been with Jaemin for long enough to know when it was time to hold his mouth shut.

“How about just some clothes?” he tried. Jaemin started licking Jeno’s hand and he pulled away.

“Turn your head down, Nana, there’s some red situation going on.”

“Oh, come on.” Jaemin whined, but did as asked, pulling his cap lower. 

 

After the emotional tumult of yesterday, Jeno felt like going into work was a break from the craziness that was his private life right now, as weird as it was to see work as an escape mechanism. 

The radio station Yeeun had playing softly kept repeating how it was Friday and that a reason to be happy, but it really wasn’t, especially since they kept repeating the story about the mysteriously abducted police officers. The moment Jeno thought he had lost himself in music and the lines of his coding, they brought to back up to remind him.

“Sorry, do you mind changing the station?” he asked by the afternoon, when he felt like he had to slam his keyboard through his screen if they said police unit number four one more time. 

“Sure, you don’t like the music?”

“No, I just… the news, it’s too depressing right now. I hope that’s fine.”

“Oh! Of course, yes, I’m sorry, I forgot there were students from your uni missing. My bad.” Yeeun switched to another station, and Jeno sighed. 

“Thanks.”

“At least it’s Friday today. You can use the weekend to relax. Do you have a date? A girlfriend to go out with?”

Jeno stared at the swimming letters on his screen. “Maybe.” Maybe he’d have a girlfriend, maybe he’d have two boyfriends. Who knew? Not him.

“Maybe?” Yeeun laughed “Is she still changing her mind about dating you?”

He didn’t want to elaborate on that any further, so he just shrugged and the conversation died. 

Half an hour before his shift was supposed to end, Jeno got another assignment, something from the boss of his boss of his boss. Put simply: The owner of the company. He sometimes got tasked with perfecting his power point presentations, but Jeno really wondered why it was necessary to do so on a Friday evening? 

But when the owner of the company asked you to do things, you did them. Jeno watched time tick by as he re-positioned pictures, changed fonts, and swore to throw the computer of whoever had made these Master slides out of the window. It’d be a service to the public, really. 

When he sent the mail, to get confirmation he was good to go home, he got the reply to please check back with the man.

While the additional trip was annoying, Jeno felt his heartbeat pick up. He had been to his office before, but rarely, he was usually busy and Jeno was about as low as you got in the company’s hierarchy. 

However, it was so late in the evening that reality seemed a little altered as it was. The working student going to check with the company owner wasn’t as weird at this time as is would be during the day. There was something about being at work, in a stiff office where you usually spent your days when the sun was up, past eight in the evening that was just creepy. Jeno sent Jaemin another text to tell them he was going to be home even later and that they shouldn’t wait with the movie. 

At least he was going to spend the weekend at the coven’s house, meaning he’d be there if they got their lead on the rebellion’s hide out, and if they didn’t, he could at least make sure Mark and Ten didn’t do anything stupid in their worry, and be with Jaemin. 

The hallway was deserted and poorly lit, and Jeno hurried to get to his boss’ office. The sooner he got approval, the better. He really wanted to go home. It felt like someone was watching him, and he checked over his shoulder, but there was no one there. He picked up his pace regardless and ascended the stairs to the first story of the part of the office building the company had rented. 

Light poured from below the door of the CEO’s office, people were talking, but Jeno couldn’t make out their words. His heart hammered in nervousness, and he checked over his shoulder once more, finding nothing suspicious at all, before he knocked. It was probably just because he was seeing the person running this whole place. That was reason for nerves, right?

“Come in.”

Jeno shuddered, glad to leave the dark hallway, and pushed the door open. 

The manager smiled at him from behind his desk.

“Ah, yes, Lee Jeno. Thank you for coming.”

“Uh. Yes, sir, I sent you the presentation I adjusted for you, did you have any complaints?”

Suddenly, the door behind him was slammed shut, and Jeno jerked around. How had that just happened? The only other person in the room was the secretary, who stood next to the desk, far away from the door, and no windows were open. No one else seemed bothered, though. 

“Oh, the presentation, yes, good job, as always.” It sounded like he hadn’t even opened the file Jeno had sent him. He knew it shouldn’t annoy him, this was the CEO, he had better things to do, but it felt a bit disrespectful. 

“Thank you, boss.” He said, trying to put on a smile. Something felt off, why was the secretary staring him down like that? Had they maybe gotten an email from the rebels after all? Would he tell him he was fired?

“Really, there wouldn’t be any reason to let you go when you always do such great work for the company.” The man continued on. That was oddly specific, so maybe they had gotten tipped off? Jeno liked his job, he really did, and he also kind of needed the money. Internally, he was preparing to pitch why they had to keep him and why these all were lies, but the man wasn’t finished. “You were the only one trying to track where those emails were coming from, you’re definitely a smart one. But not smart enough.”

Jeno’s blood ran cold, as his internal pitch slipped from his grasp and pure panic too its place. 

“Y-you sent those emails?” he slowly asked. 

No. It couldn’t be. How could they have missed that?

Hidden in plain sight.

So much so, that Jeno had worked for them.

“Well, yes I did. I was most delighted to find some little ex-hunter apply for a job, what better opportunity, hm? But… I heard you caused my people a lot of trouble in confinement. Not only you, your friends as well.”

Jeno backed away. He had to get to the door, had to run back downstairs, get his phone, tell the others. He had to get help, tell them he had found the rebels.

“Don’t worry, it’ll all end tomorrow. Hunters, they’ll no longer be when we come back. First, we’ll take out Ulsan, then Suwon, Gwangju, Daejeon, Daegu, Incheon, Busan, and, finally, Seoul. From their blood, we will rise and rule.”

“You’re insane.” Jeno whispered. He felt the door in his back now. He had to get away. This man… monster, he was completely crazy.

“No, I’m not. I’m a genius. I’d like to keep you around, so you could see the glory, but I had to notice that you… unfortunately… were the reason one of my favourite minions had to die. An eye for an eye, his life repaid by yours. But don’t worry, I have a surprise, you won’t get a boring death.

Jeno rattled on the handle, but it didn’t budge. The door was locked. He was trapped, at the mercy of the slowly inclosing man. 

“You won’t get through with that. The Hunting Union is too big.”

“They’re big, but they’re weak when you know where to hit. They’ll crumble like a cookie.”

“No, they won’t. You won’t get through with that.” Jeno pressed against the door with all his weight now, but it was no use, it didn’t open. 

“I’m almost tempted to let you live to see how wrong you are. But there’s some hungry carnivores waiting for dinner.”

“No. No, please.” Jeno gasped, but he was grabbed, and his head tilted up. He saw the red of the vampire’s eyes and then he lost consciousness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Most of you guessed right in the comments I got~
> 
> [ CuriousCat](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No update yesterday bc of Eurovision - congrat to the Netherlands ^^  
> I edited this on 4 hours of sleep lol

Jeno felt himself move. He couldn’t see where he was going, but he was going somewhere. It had to be the bewitchment. He felt like he should be scared, angry, maybe. But he just didn’t feel anything, like he was incapable of having emotions. It was like he was trapped, cursed to complete passiveness in his own body. No senses, no emotions, barely rational thought.

He had known bewitchment was more than a party trick to make your friend say things like “I’m an idiot”, but to feel its true extent was something else. The objective thought that this wasn’t so great was all he could feel right now, though.

It hadn’t been very long since his last kidnapping, but nothing felt as desolating and terrifying as this. Or… it should. If he could feel that. Jeno would go back to having someone try and pour blood down his throat or press down on his nails until he screamed in pain over this feeling of complete loss of control any day.

In a way, he was glad he hadn’t looked into any vampire’s eyes the last time, because he wasn’t sure he wouldn’t have gone crazy.

Right now, at least he knew Jaemin and Renjun were safe.

He felt his body stop and stand somewhere, he didn’t hear, see, or taste, and he was already feeling himself lose grip on his sanity.

Before that could happen, reality seemed to come back. As though someone had flipped a switch, Jeno was suddenly back to himself, standing in a simply lit, cold room, that smelt as if something had died here weeks ago.

He looked around, but no one else was here. He was alone in a completely empty room. The walls had been light orange at one point, but the paint was ruined by dampness in the walls making mould grow in odd patterns over it, some cracks breaking the dark pattern up. That was probably the smell.

Jeno had to hold his nose and mouth shut to keep from throwing up. The smell was beyond foul, but knowing where it came from made it even harder.

However, the walls full of mould weren’t the true problem awaiting him here.

From behind him, the rattling sound of a metal gate being shoved open echoed through the room he had previously assumed to be empty. Jeno felt cold sweat run down his back. The feeling of eyes being focussed on him overwhelmed him, to the point that he was terrified of even turning around.

He didn’t want to know what had been behind the door that had just opened. At the same time, he didn’t have a choice. Neither a window, nor a door were currently in front of him, he must have come in from behind himself, from exactly where the door had just opened. Where the eyes he felt on himself were.

The worst part was the perfect silence in which the room laid. The only thing he could hear was his own breathing, heavy and too hurried, even the thundering of his heart, but no evidence that anyone else was here, other than this… belief that there was. If the others weren’t even breathing that meant they didn’t have to.

Vampires.

Then again, if they hadn’t moved, maybe they wouldn’t if Jeno just kept still? Or maybe they were closing in as he was still trying to figure things out, getting ready to strike from where he couldn’t see them, had no chance at all to fight them off?

Very slowly, Jeno turned in his spot, scared from what he might find.

Countless eyes stared back at him, faintly glowing red in the dimly lit room.

Jeno pressed his hand closer over his mouth, trying to muffle the scream of utter horror.

As he stared at them, weirdly, they kept staring back, but no one spoke, no one moved, nothing. Jeno tried to even out his breathing that was more like hysteric gasps right now, but his body was in fight or flight mode, not bothering to calm down any time soon.

Were they bewitched? To wait? So he’d get as scared as possible, to make this worse for him? Or were they actually not going to harm him? Were the red eyes just – how Jaemin had called it – a natural reflex?

Oh, Jaemin, Renjun… were they watching the film right now? Were they worrying? How much time had passed? Or were they still oblivious, believing him to be in the office? With his boss, who apparently ran a rebellion on the side?

It had been nearly a week since he had drunk the vampire blood. If this army of them would attack him now, that was it. He wouldn’t wake back up.

He was going to die – and not in a boring way, but what good was that if he didn’t even have anyone to tell that to?

As he waited for anything to happen, Jeno eyed them more carefully. Somehow, the faces felt familiar, like he had seen them before?

Then, his eyes fell on a very, very, very familiar face, his usual nearly permanent smile replaced with a grim line his lips were set in, making the red eyes stand out even more.

“Hyuck!” Jeno gasped, but didn’t dare get closer to his friend. He scanned the other vampires again, looking for a specific face, but Johnny wasn’t among them. Had they not turned all of them? Or was he simply kept elsewhere?

Or had something happened to him?

He didn’t know what to do, could he move, should he stay? Donghyuck seemed to recognise him, he didn’t see the ring that’d give away bewitchment – and it should be easy to see with the strong contrast of the red irises the vampires had.

Why were all their eyes red? Were they going to do something? If so, why hadn’t they already?

Jeno didn’t know whether to feel relief or more panic.

Donghyuck forced a smile onto his face. “Hi.”

It had been only two days since all of these people had gone missing, meaning they had only been vampires for a maximum of one day. None of them should be hungry yet, but as Jeno kept looking at them, he got the impression they were.

Very hungry.

But none of them have moved, still.

“Guys… what’s going on?” Jeno asked, his voice shaky from fear.

But no one spoke. Instead, they started stepping away from each other. A path opened between them. A path right to the door in the back of the room, which they had been blocking.

Was this a trick? What was this?

Jeno looked around in confusion.

“Go!” Someone said.

“We don’t want to hurt you.” Another added.

Walking right through a group of possibly hungry, maybe aggressive vampires, that may or may not be tricking him didn’t sound very safe. Then again, neither did staying in the dead end of a room full of these vampires.

“Really?” Jeno asked.

“Yes.”

“We decided we couldn’t give in to them.”

“We’re above this.”

“It’s not the end, if we don’t become monsters.”

“We chose not to.”

Jeno slowly nodded and stepped forward.

“One more question: There’s people missing from you, right? They took more.”

“They did?”

“We don’t know.”

“Johnny Suh. He’s missing, too, I’m not entirely sure who else.”

“Johnny?” Donghyuck gasped and darted forward, only to immediately be held back.

“Just go! We don’t have good control.”

“It’s a ticking time bomb until one of us goes feral.”

Jeno nodded.

Feral vampires were a thing. Just how humans sometimes decided to turn to cannibalism to survive, vampires close to drying up into vampire-mummies would lose themselves in bloodthirst. It was far more dangerous than a hungry human, because they were stronger to begin with, and Jeno was glad to never have experienced it.

So, he stepped between the waiting vampires and when no one made a move to maul him, he hurried past them, towards the door.

He reached it without anyone stepping in his way, however he did hear someone snarl, someone being pushed. When he looked, it was clear that their control was hanging by a threat. He had to get out of here, no matter what was behind the door, if he stayed, he was dead meat.

He caught Donghyuck’s eyes again, but his friend looked away first. Not fast enough, though. Jeno had seen the shame in those blazing red eyes.

“Thank you.” He said. “I’m sure it’ll be fine, the Hunters have to make prisoners, not kill on sight.”

Surprised gasps echoed through the crowd, but before Jeno could offer more information, someone all but growled from the lower ranks and the sound of bodies slapping into each other as the vampire was caught by the others ruined the moment of understanding.

Jeno pressed down the handle and the door opened with a small push, letting him out of the stuffy, gross room into a cold hallway.

He made sure to close it softly, but he wished he had a way to block it. Not only so no one followed him, but also to avoid anyone getting in there and harming them.

Again, Jeno found himself with no clue where he was and no plan. Last time, this hadn’t ended well for him, but once more he didn’t have time to think.

Of course, he didn’t have his phone on him. That was at the office, on his desk. Maybe.

His best shot was just getting the absolute fuck out of here.

It shouldn’t be too hard.

He glanced around to see which way would be his best shot. To both his sides, metal doors stretched, the while paint on the walls cracked everywhere. At least the smell wasn’t as bad here, and he didn’t see any mould.

Compared to the last house, this was a lot more run down, gave him more of a horror movie setting. Not that he wanted that. Quite the contrary. Jeno’s heart kept hammering out of his chest, like a walking alarm for any supernatural to easily spot, and his he felt all the muscles on his body tremble.

Unfortunately, there was no window on this hallway, like there had been at the other compound. That would have really been helpful right now.

If he tried doors, he’d risk running into someone belonging to the rebels, or god knew what else they had hidden here. Staying here, in the open, on the other hand seemed like the most dangerous place.

How likely was it that the Hunters, covens, and packs would find a lead just now, that he had been taken, and come to his rescue?

Not very.

Jeno nearly let out a small sob of frustration, but he held back. He was probably loud enough with his thundering heart as it was.

If he were an architect, he’d locate staircases on the edge, so trying the doors on the far end first seemed most reasonable to him. If there were no windows here, there was a chance he was in a cellar, underground. Not exactly a good place to get noticed or to flee from.

Left or right?

Jeno closed his eyes for a second and tried to find a gut feeling. Something told him to try the left, so, he turned that direction and headed down the hallway, trying to keep his footfall as soft as possible.

He leaned against the metal and tried to listen, tried to hear something, anything, behind it. But there was no sound loud enough for his ears to pick up.

It didn’t mean that there was nothing there. But it meant there was no reason not to try it.

So, he slowly pushed the handle down, only to find the door locked. Relief over not having to face whatever might be behind it, and disappointment over still being stuck in the hallway mixed in Jeno’s chest, and he turned to quickly check the door on the other side.

Again, he found it locked. He checked his pockets, but he only came up with a receipt for having bought a pack of Kit Kats a few weeks ago. Nothing that’d help him open a door.

He crossed the hallway to give the doors on the other side a try. The first one there was locked as well, but behind the other, he heard voices.

Jeno had to swallow to keep from freaking out and running. There was nowhere to run, or he would have. Instead, he slowly and silently backed away. Who knew who was behind it, but chances were too high it was someone of this rebellion. With this, he was out of doors on the end of the hallway to try.

What else to try? The middle? One by one?

All he knew was: he had to hurry. The people from that room might finish and leave, or someone might check on what they’d expect to be a bloodbath in the cellar.

He leaned against the next door, and when it was silent behind, he tried the handle. It opened and Jeno took a small breath or relief.

Until he noticed the large figure of a wolf staring back at him.

Now, Jeno knew how werewolves in their turned form looked in theory. But staring at one of them, eye to eye, hadn’t happened yet.

Frankly, he wished it had, so he could have been better prepared. He couldn’t stop a small squeak from breaking from his lips. The animal was huge. Reaching to his chest including the head. The wolf stepped closer, cocking its head. Their eyes were intelligent, speaking of this not just being an animal, but someone able to shift their form, just how Jeno had assumed.

“Ohmygod.” Jeno whispered. Would it be best to get the fuck out of here?

Yes.

But there was still no place to go to. Only a second later, the form of the wolf melted away into a human – a very naked human, but right now that was about the last thing worrying Jeno.

“You smell of Kun.” The human pointed out.

“Excuse me?”

“Kun. You’re scared, too. You’re not with them, right? Why are you here?”

Jeno stared at the man in front of him, tried to piece together how he had concluded all this. Were wolves’ noses really that good?

“Yeah, I… uh I was supposed to become dinner but the vampires let me go?” Jeno offered.

“Good. Thank you for opening that door. We have to get out of here.”

“Yes, well, good idea but we’re pretty trapped here.”

“What’s your name?” the man asked. He had a compelling way to speak, despite not being very tall and relatively petite. It reminded Jeno a little of Renjun, who also had this way to them. He missed Renjun. He missed Jaemin. He was scared he might never see them again.

Jeno pushed the feeling aside to answer:

“Lee Jeno.”

“Good. Jeno, you need to get out here just as much as me, or you will definitely become dinner. Might be handy to open doors, too. Stick close.”

“Wait what? Why should I trust you?” Jeno whispered. What was even going on?

“I mean, you can not and stay here and wait until they find a bloodsucker willing to take your blood.”

Jeno sputtered, but the wolf was already turning back to his other form and pushed past Jeno and out the door.

So, he followed him.

The second they were in the hall, it became apparent that Jeno, as a human, really was the least capable person to free himself from any situation ever, because the wolf sniffed once, and then headed right for a door half-way down the hall. He nodded his head at it and Jeno pushed the handle down, finding it unlocked and a staircase behind.

Wherever they were, it was the lowest level of this house, because there were only steps upwards. Jeno hurried after the wolf that immediately started jumping them up.

After four flights, he finally spotted a window. Not just a cellar, but rather a whole bunker underground, Jeno concluded. Maybe, the building had been built with the Korean war in mind, giving a place to stay safe in case of new attacks.

At the same time, a place ideal to hide. Through this much soil, sound and scent wouldn’t travel, not even to supernatural senses.

Freedom was so close, at the tips of his fingers, and Jeno hurried to push the window open. The wolf took a running start and pushed himself off the ground the same moment that the door was ripped open and screaming people came into the staircase.

The wolf landed outside, but he noticed the people, too.

If he got away, he could alert authorities, get his alpha, god knew what. But he had to run. Now! If Jeno tried to follow, they wouldn’t be able to make it, not to mention that he was literally dead weight, too slow, too easily exhausted. The vampires would catch him no matter what.

“Go!” he yelled, and the wolf turned in his place and darted into the darkness without a second of hesitation. People grabbed Jeno, holding his arms, torso, legs, completely immobilising him.

Some jumped out of the window, to follow the wolf, and Jeno closed his eyes, hoping that the other were faster, or at least managed to alert someone, anyone.

With the case still big on the news, even a random passer-by would hopefully be enough. They’d tell the police, who’s alter the Hunters, who’d let the covens and packs know. It seemed to be the middle of the night by now, but Jeno just hoped there’d be someone still awake, who’d notice and take action.

There had to.

He knew he couldn’t win on his own. He needed the Union, he needed the super naturals.

And then, hopefully, they’d keep their promise and make prisoners, not go behind their backs and stab stakes into chests while no one was watching. Donghyuck... 

At least the wolf knew his name, so hopefully, the message where he was would get to Jaemin and Renjun. Probably the message of his death, Jeno guessed, as his head was ripped backwards by his hair and he struggled to keep his eyes shut to avoid bewitchment. Not again. People were yelling into his ears about how they’d slowly and brutally kill him now. The faster the news travelled, the better. Jeno wasn’t sure how much longer he could stay alive here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You might be wondering: how will she wrap this up in only one more chapter? And you're not alone. I also ask myself the same question lol
> 
>  
> 
> [CC](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)


	11. Chapter 11

Jeno struggled against the hold on him, but it was useless, as always. 

“Let me go!” he screamed, he tried kicking, but they just dragged him down the hall like a stubborn toddler. 

“Don’t worry, it’ll be over soon.” One of the people said, and Jeno could hear the arrogance in her voice, could imagine the smirk on her face despite not being able to see. 

He was pushed down into a chair and his arms were fixed to the rests, tied down with hard rope that cut into his skin and flesh from being pulled too tight. 

“Idiot, that cuts off the bloodstream.”

“So what, just slit his throat, doesn’t matter.”

Jeno tried to breathe evenly. If they cut his neck, it was far easier to just bleed out. A little too deep, and there would only be seconds left. Apparently, one of them thought the same thing.

“We want him to be aware, though. Loosen it.”

It was getting a bit boring to be used as a blood donor without consent over and over, at the same time, Jeno remembered Jaemin biting him, the burning pain of the wound, and he felt more fear course through his body. He didn’t want a repeat. He didn’t want to die by being drained to the point where his circulation would collapse. 

He couldn’t die, not with so much that’d be left behind: Jaemin, Renjun, the coven, his studies, he liked all of that. He was only 20, for god’s sake, that was no age to die at!

“So he can pull free? This is the guy that broke a vampire’s neck, remember? I wouldn’t underestimate him.”

Jeno felt weirdly flattered that they’d say this. But now really wasn’t the time to take compliments from borderline insane rebels to heart. 

“Femoral artery.” he gritted out. If they were going to slit some part open, he’d rather have that place be on his leg than on his neck.

A moment of quiet followed his suggestion, but then the two muttered in agreement. 

He felt the blade press down on his jeans and rip through the fabric until the metal was cold on his skin. When they cut deeper, Jeno couldn’t hold the whimper from pain. It was immediately followed by the gross feeling of warm blood running down his thigh, seeping into the material of his bottoms and making them wet and sticky. 

“Should be good enough.”

“Yeah. Let’s get one of these annoying fuckers.”

The door was slammed shut and Jeno opened his eyes.

He was in yet another mouldy room. How could such a terrible house still stand in the city, surely all this dampness would affect the stability of the walls, right? He breathed through his mouth to avoid the rotten stench, mixed with the metallic one of his own blood. It made him nauseous. 

He wondered if he should check how bad the damage on his legs was. He decided against it, because it wouldn’t help him, on the contrary, he might actually throw up, so he kept his eyes upwards and pressed his legs together, hoping to apply pressure on the wound. 

He wiggled his hands, but the ropes only cut deeper into his arms, and he gave up. How far away from Seoul’s city centre were they? Probably not much, he had seen houses outside the window, so he assumed they were still within the city borders. 

It shouldn’t take the Hunters long to get here. How long would it take for him to bleed out? He could lose two litres of blood for sure before having to really worry. Usually, bleeding looked worse than it was, he told himself, surely he hadn’t even lost close to that amount.

He’d survive this. He had to. He wanted to.

Unfortunately, the chances of survival dropped when the door was opened and a person pushed inside, stumbling as he lost balance and fell to the ground in front of Jeno.

He slowly raised his head and Jeno wasn’t surprised to see they had chosen Donghyuck. Surely, they knew they had a connection, the whole vampire-equality movement had probably found its way into their files, and it had been made abundantly clear they had full access to those. 

“Jeno.” Donghyuck whimpered. 

“Well, this is unfortunate.” Jeno sighed. Donghyuck’s eyes were glowing and fangs were digging into his lower lip. 

His friend slowly scooted backwards, until he bumped into the door. He tried the handle, but it was locked – of course.

“No. I can’t.” he whispered, before he ran out of air to use to talk. Donghyuck curled up into himself, pulling his legs close and wrapping his arms around them, but his eyes never left Jeno, hunger shining in them.

“Can you just… take a little?” Jeno suggested. Donghyuck immediately shook his head, the grab around his legs tightening. Maybe they had drained their newly turned vampires, to make them hungry, more aggressive. Jeno had heard of that happening before.

And, of course, no one would have taught them how to feed yet. It was an art in itself if you took from the living, rather than make a smoothie and added bagged blood.

He wasn’t sure how hungry exactly Donghyuck was, how hard keeping himself under control was, but from the looks… it didn’t seem good. 

Jeno wasn’t sure what to do. 

“Tell me what to do to make this better!”

Donghyuck shrugged, looking tiny and miserable, scared, more scared than Jeno himself.

“Should I distract you?” he suggested. 

Donghyuck nodded, then rested his forehead on his knees, completely hiding his face from Jeno.

“Okay. Well. You missed a lot of shit going down, that’s for sure.” He tried to lighten the mood, tried to ignore he was still bleeding and Donghyuck had been turned – against his will, presumably. If he pretended this was just a meeting in the cafeteria, or in the dorms, this was easier. Easier not to lose hope that they’d be found and saved before more harm would be inflicted on them.

He fell into mindless chatter. There was no system to his retellings, he just said the first thing that came to mind. He retold Ten fighting with Kun multiple times, he explained their shopping trip, how he had waltzed right into “Mr. V”’s arms, how Mina had broken up with Mark, that Chenle had found the secret out.

He also mentioned the wolf. He kept repeating that the hunters would be here soon, that they were working together now, and surely the wolf must have alerted them and they’d find them.

Soon.

But as he kept talking, Jeno’s vision started to get blurry and he had to blink more and more often to keep focus. Then, he started to just forget words, and he heard himself slur them together. His clothing was soaked in blood, that much was clear, so he had probably lost too much at this point. 

“Hyuck, I really don’t feel too good.” He pressed out, and Donghyuck looked up, but his face was hard to make out. 

“Jeno, I can’t. I don’t have control I…”

A bang broke off his stuttering. The door was ripped from its hinges, clean off, making Donghyuck topple over. 

People he didn’t recognise streamed inside. Someone grabbed Donghyuck off the ground, someone else ripped through the rope on his arms and grabbed him, propping him up. Jeno’s head lolled forward and he had to gather all his strength to straighten back up.

“Jeno? Donghyuck? What the hell?” it was Johnny’s voice and he turned to see if they were saved, but instead, he found Johnny held back by several people, just like himself. 

“You better not do anything funny or these three are dead.” Someone snarled behind himself. Oh yes, that was the voice of his boss. The feeling of blood now running down his leg distracted him. It was just so hard to focus. Maybe, he could just close his eyes…

“Johnny!” he blinked and looked up.

In the door were two people, someone in a blue jacket and Ten.

“It’s useless. We have the whole building surrounded, just give up.” The Hunter snarled and Jeno felt something press into his back. It felt like a knife. How sweet.

“Well, if these three aren’t worth being saved…”

“No!” Ten pushed forward, past the Hunter.

“Stay back!” one of the people holding them barked, and Ten froze. Jeno felt his heart sink. He could only imagine how Ten felt seeing Johnny like this but being helpless. In a way, he was glad neither Jaemin nor Renjun were here. He could barely keep it together as it was.

“Please, please let them go.”

“Let our men and women go. Remove all troops and let us leave the city to hide elsewhere. No tracking, no following, nothing.”

“You’re insane. We’re not going to do any of that.” The Hunter laughed. 

“Are you going to sacrifice these three? Are their lives not important enough?” Ten hissed. 

“There’s three lives versus the stability of South Korea. This isn’t even a question.”

“That… no. No, that’s three people here, you cannot be serious!” Ten was slowly getting more agitated. 

“Tennie. It’s fine. Like he said, three lives versus a whole country. You can’t compare that.” Johnny suddenly spoke. Ten jerked around from where he had been glaring at the Hunter he was with.

“No. No, Johnny, no, you cannot be serious.” Ten stepped towards them and a gruesome crack ripped through the room, followed by Donghyuck screaming. Jeno felt like throwing up. 

Ten stepped back. 

“Make a decision. We’ll give you 30 seconds.” The boss announced. 

30 seconds. That wasn’t very long. Donghyuck kept whimpering to his left, holding the arm someone had twisted in a way that didn’t look anatomically correct, while Johnny remained stoic. Jeno wasn’t so sure about himself, other than that he was gasping for air and feeling more and more nauseous as blood kept dripping down his leg. 

“30, 29, 28, 27, 26”

“Ten, please. It’ll be alright. Take them out. They’re too dangerous to be kept alive just for our sake.” Johnny softly said. 

“No.”

“25, 24, 23, 22, 21”

“Y-yeah. It’s okay. Like this, I at least don’t have to have these annoying fights with Mark anymore.” Donghyuck laughed, but he immediately followed it up with a sniff. 

“20, 19, 18, 17, 16”

Jeno wasn’t sure he’d survive this even if they didn’t yank a knife into his back. He felt pretty shitty, to be honest. It’d suck to be given up in turn of the conditions and then just die in Jaemin’s arms or some ridiculous stuff like that. Really, not a cute look. 

It was the only rational option to give them up. Jeno wouldn’t feel resentful. On the contrary, it’d be a relatively good cause to die for, the safety of your home country, of the people you loved. 

This was probably the hostage situation that Kun and Donghyuck’s plan a week ago had tried to avoid. Maybe this scale was too big to remember something like that. Maybe Kun hadn’t been listened to, Donghyuck hadn’t been there to give tips. It could happen, Jeno was shit at making plans, he would have probably forgotten to remember this was a risk, too.

It would have been nice to have kissed Renjun and Jaemin goodbye. Maye go on a real date, not the shopping trip. He would have liked to hear how things between Mark and Mina turned out, if Jisung ever figured out the vampire situation.

Johnny’s deep voice kept saying soft and soothing words, but they slipped his mind.

“15, 14, 13, 12, 11”

He hadn’t really leant a lot about Renjun’s magical powers, had he? He also hadn’t had a lot of time to cuddle them, kiss them, get to know them as a whole person, on girl and on boy days, more. Even Jaemin, he felt like he hadn’t had enough time with. Yeah, well, you weren’t really meant to die at 20, so, of course, he had had too little time to really live.

It was just… unfortunate.

“It’ll be fine, Ten. I love you, but I need you to be safe, everyone to be safe, we can’t be selfish.”

“Please tell Mark I’m sorry I couldn’t be his best man.”

Jeno tired to find words in his brain. “Tell… tell Renjun… and Jaemin…. I love them…” he couldn’t hold a tear running down his face. He knew he was doing the right thing.

“10, 9, 8, 7, 6”

“We’re not going to give in to some cheap blackmail. Give up, you’ve lost. Your plan was doomed to fail from the beginning, but against the Union plus the super naturals of Seoul, you don’t stand a chance.”

“No. No, you’re wrong. My plan is brilliant. I won’t fail. I will…. I will rule, I will squash you all, I will make this world a better place, without humans. I will win!” 

“Please, how do vampires survive without humans? Blood is your essence of life! Your plan’s lacking severely.” 

The Hunter drew a gun, but before he had even aimed, Jeno felt the blade in his back break skin.

He gasped for air, but the pain was numbed from already having lost so much blood. 

He was pushed forward from the force with which it was stabbed through his torso, and the squelching noise it made when it exited it on his front was gruesome. He expected to hear Johnny and Donghyuck face similar fates, but instead, a new voice ripped through the room.

“No!”

His vision got weaker and weaker, a static sound rung in his ears that made his head feel like it was going to crack open, but he saw the people holding him and the others grab their necks, as the outlines of the veins running through their bodies started showing. He was let go of and fell to his knees, too weak to stand up on his own. Their faces turned purple, that then grey, and then they started breaking apart, falling into pieces that immediately crumbled into dust. 

Johnny gasped and dropped to the ground, Donghyuck groaned where he fell. So, they were safe. That was a relief. 

“No, no, no!” it was Renjun, who screamed. Their voice was usually so beautiful, but full of pain now.

Jeno’s body just gave out, and he toppled over onto the ground. He had lost way too much blood, his pants were wet from it, and now his shirt was getting bloody, too. Really, what a waste. If at least someone had drunken all this blood he kept losing. Someone turned him onto his back, but he could hardly even open his eyes anymore.

“Jeno, stay with me.” Renjun’s face was over his, but it was blurry at best. He tried to reach up, but his arm didn’t move. 

Ten appeared next to him, and he was saying something, but Jeno couldn’t hear him anymore. It felt like he was ten metres under water, every sound muffled to basically nothing, only the static remaining. 

He tried to tell Renjun that he loved them, and to tell Jaemin he loved his as well, but words didn’t come. 

He breathed out, and when he tried to breathe in again, he found that he couldn’t. Renjun’s and Ten’s faces blurred into black and all the noise completely disappeared, leaving him in complete darkness. 

 

A moment later, he could open his eyes again, easily now, without the lethargy he had just felt. He looked around. He couldn’t feel his body, but when he checked to see, it was there. He stood in a dimly lit room. Weird. He found the only source of light in the distance and he felt a pull towards it. He somehow knew he had to go there!

Well. That meant he hadn’t made it, then. That sucked. But he couldn’t feel too sad. It had been a good cause, he had had a good life. Short, maybe, but eventful.

He took the first step, and suddenly, he was on a playground. It was an old memory, one of his earliest he could still recall. Normally, it was blurry and had holes in it, but now it was suddenly clear and bright, like it was happening this moment, not 15 years ago. 

“Jeno, come on, let’s go home, appa will be home soon.” 

He looked up and found his mother smile down at him, holding out her hand. Her face was younger than in the photos he kept to remind himself of her, and she was smiling brightly. He reached out and took her hand. As he grabbed it, the scene suddenly switched, to his old room. There were animal posters stuck to the walls, some Legos on the ground. 

“Surprise!” A cake appeared in front of him and Jeno was suddenly face to face with his father, beaming at him and holding the cake. “How does it feel to be such a big boy, hm? You’re growing up so much, young man! You Eomma and I couldn’t be prouder!”

He reached out to ruffle his hair, just when he reached him, the scene blurred again. 

Suddenly, there were the blue mats on the ground, that were supposed to lessen falls when other trainees brought you down.

“That was miserable! You suck so much! Lucky for you, I’ll show you how to not suck this much!” a bright voice announced, and a hand appeared in front of his face and Jeno followed it to the face belonging to the voice. Donghyuck grinned at him, his hair curly and longer, face a little chubby and tanner than it was nowadays. “I’m Donghyuck, we should be friends, new guy.”

Jeno was about to take the hand offered to him, when the scene broke, like glass that shattered. 

Instead of the soft light and the feeling of nothingness, the lights were bright and cold. There was definitely something in his chest that didn’t belong there, it felt rather uncomfortable, too. Not to mention how gross and dirty his clothing felt. 

“Holy shit!” someone gasped. 

Jeno looked around.

That was the room he had last been in.

The one he had died in.

“Oh my god.”

Renjun sat next to him. There was sparkle all over their face and they looked pale and exhausted. 

And rather surprised to see him. 

“Uh…” Jeno looked around. Ten and Johnny were staring at him, plus a crowd from the door. Donghyuck was pinned down under Ten, but he was also staring at Jeno.

Jeno looked down on himself and realised that the uncomfortable feeling was a knife that stuck in his chest. 

“Shit, I think that was illegal.” Renjun whispered, before their eyes rolled backwards and Jeno only just caught them before they hit the ground. 

“Let me through!”

“No one’s allowed…”

“Do I look like I give a fucking shit?” Jaemin pushed a Hunter aside and burst into the room. 

“Fuck, what the… Jeno, why is there a knife in your chest? Wait, why don’t you have a heartbeat? Why is that not bleeding?” 

Jaemin slammed down on the ground next to him, his hands patting over Jeno, then over Renjun.

“It’s not bleeding?” Jeno asked. He felt quite bloody, but when he touched, there was actually no fresh blood running down anymore. He felt over his heart but, indeed, it wasn’t beating. He still felt good, though. 

“Um, guys, I’m not entirely sure what territory we’re moving on right now.” Ten’s voice suddenly cut in “Do you feel the need to rip anyone’s head off, Jeno?” 

Jeno considered it. He looked at the Hunters that blocked the door and looked at them with wide eyes. None of them felt particularly delicious to him, nor did he feel the sudden need to become a mass murderer for the thrill of it. “No.”

“Drink someone’s blood? Eat their brain?”

“Erm. Now.” Brains were so wobbly and gross, Jeno would rather not get within two metres of those.

“Gentlemen, what are you doing here? We have about 700 people to hold captive right now, I think your attention is needed elsewhere, this is clearly an internal problem from what I gathered so far.” Jeno looked to the door again, to see who was talking to the Hunters in such a pleasant voice.

“Well, whatever this is… magic? What is this even, this wasn’t part of the agreement.”

“Oh, but the agreement is over, isn’t it? I don’t think you’ve seen anything here that has to do with magic.” It was Kun, his voice so pleasant and sweet Jeno felt himself start to doubt he had seen any magic, too. 

“Right, I haven’t.”

“Glad we got that out of the way. Now, downstairs there’s a lot to do.”

“Yeah…” the man muttered, and they started moving. Jeno swallowed. Now that he had felt it, he suddenly felt a lot differently over seeing the vampire bewitch a whole crowd with such ease.

Kun put his hands on his hips and looked around the room. “I think we have a lot to figure out, don’t we? Joohyun’s handling negotiations over what will happen with the turned Hunters, though…” his eyes landed on Donghyuck, still under Ten, and on Johnny next to him. “You’re not a Hunter and you weren’t turned.” 

“Yeah, what can I say?” Johnny laughed and shrugged. “Gotta love humanity.”

 

The whole house was in a state of utter chaos, no one even really cared when their group marched past, towards the exit. Not to mention, they weren’t the only ones. With their deal basically fulfilled, the other vampires and wolves were on the way to leave before anything could go south and the Hunting Union could change their minds about sparing them, while the officers in blue jackets collected evidence and swept the floors. Jeno shuddered at the implication of what the piles of ashes meant.

Jeno was next to Jaemin, who had the still unconscious Renjun in his arms. He felt like he’d faint any second, too, just from being so overwhelmed by everything that had happened. Somehow, he managed to keep going. It’d be nice to pull out the knife in his chest, but no one really knew if they could or it that would cause more damage, so they left it in. It didn’t hurt, it was only uncomfortable, and where you might be concerned over his lungs, Jeno found he didn’t need to breathe. 

It was a little similar to the vampires, but Ten had confirmed he wasn’t one and he couldn’t be. He had died to quickly for them to feed him any vampire blood, so the transformation couldn’t have happened – and it also would have taken 24 hours.

So, for now, Jeno figured he’d just go with Zombie. It was very weird, a little scary even. But he was alive and he was grateful for that – or a-un-live. He still wasn’t sure about the correct wording.

As they moved through hallways and staircases, more and more members of the coven returned. Some asked in confusion what had happened, some eyed the blade with interest, some gave Jeno encouraging smiles. No one question if he was allowed to come with them, and Jeno was very happy they didn’t. Because he couldn’t really handle rejection of the people he considered something like a family, especially ever since Jaemin’s turning, in his current state.

When the door was finally right in front of them, Seulgi suddenly stepped inside and blocked the way. They, together with the packs and covens that had also been on their way out, stopped and she looked around the crowd gathered.

“Negotiations have ended. Every coven can pick new members from the Hunters turned into vampires and not killed in the battle, and the Union will not put them on the red list, however, you’ll have to check back with Joohyun who you’ll be adding, so we know who’ll be left over and added to our coven.” She winked. 

“I’ll be off that missing list?” Jaemin asked.

“Yes, that’s the deal.” Seulgi confirmed.

“Well, but you’ll be in their systems.” Jeno muttered. He wasn’t completely satisfied with that. What if they changed their mind? What if they had left loopholes? Kun bewitching all these Hunters to forget about Renjun had clearly been stretching it – even though it was extremely important, because Renjun had said several times how fairies had survived by completely hiding their existence for centuries. Who said they wouldn’t do the same?

“It’s better than having to hide for decades. Look, everyone kept their promises… until the end of the deal, that is. The Union has seen we aren’t evil. I don’t think it’ll go back to pure hatred, how it’s been before.”

Jeno nodded slowly. Even when he and Donghyuck had been fighting for better treatment, there had been some in the higher levels that had listened to them. Maybe, these voices would now become loud enough and actually make a difference?

The backyard they exited into was even more chaotic than the inside. There were still people in handcuffs that hadn’t been transported off to wherever the Hunters intended to keep them, but they stood still due to bewitchment holding them in place. There were wolves, vampires, Hunters, everyone running around. There were people looking out of their windows, press behind the police tape that kept taking photos and filmed.

He could only hope these images would be kept from being published by officials, or he’d have a hard time explaining why his face was all over the news. Not to mention the front of the blade wasn’t hidden by the jacket Johnny had given him, at least not completely.

Jeno spotted the Union’s president, standing with Joohyun and a few other women. There was a small smile playing on her lips that told Jeno their conversation couldn’t be going too badly.

“Hey, good to see you made it.” Jeno looked around in surprise, and found the face that belonged to the wolf that had led him out of the cellar. Luckily, he was dressed now - only in jeans, but better than nothing. 

“Uh, yeah, thanks.”

“You realised there’s a knife in your chest?”

“Yeah, not sure what to do about that yet.”

“Right. Well, it’s still good to see you didn’t have to sacrifice yourself. I felt quite upset over that, but there was no other way out.” His face was stoic, but he sounded sincere.

“There wasn’t, I was glad you didn’t waste time.”

“Wait, what? What did you do?” Jaemin gasped. 

“Kyungsoo, are you coming? We need to get going!” someone yelled and the wolf sighed.

“Well, that’s my call. See you again… maybe.” The wolf patted Jeno’s shoulder and turned, headed towards a group of people set to leave. 

“Jeno, what did you do? Sacrificed, what?”

“Jeno, how did you get Kyungsoo to talk to you? I tried to for years now and he won’t.” Jungwoo was suddenly in his ear and Jeno turned his attention to him, rather than explaining to his boyfriend that he had, indeed, intended to sacrifice himself – twice.

Kun was counting people, before clapping his hands.

“Boys, that’s everyone, let’s go home.”

 

Seoul’s streets weren’t as busy as they should be at a Friday evening, but people had probably been scared of the terrorists still on the run. Some party folk was on the street, staring at the screens broadcasting the news of the terrorism cell having been caught with the help of a civil police unit. There were none of the videos Jeno had seen them take, and no one bothered giving them a second glance as the marched through the streets. 

When the door shut behind them, Jeno was happy to finally be really safe. Here, no one would suddenly jump out and ask him anything. No one would take him captive again.

It was finally over!

He found himself on a plastic bag on the sofa – to protect the fabric, it was understandable, but he still felt a bit dumb, while Jaehyun inspected Donghyuck’s arm. As a licenced doctor (the licence was fake, but he had gotten the education at some point), Jeno felt relatively safe putting the knife-in-chest-problem into his hands. 

“Simple dislocation. It’ll heal within 24 hours and with a bit of blood, or we’ll quickly put it back in place now.” He suggested. 

Donghyuck’s eyes were still blasting red and Mark was holding him, just in case he tried to attack Johnny again, or maybe Renjun this time. 

“Won’t that hurt?” Donghyuck lisped between his fangs.

“Just a little.”

From the scream Donghyuck left out when Jaehyun tugged on his arm, Jeno started thinking Jaehyun’s pain-rating different from his own.

Donghyuck looked rather out of it, but at least his arm was normal again. Yangyang came from the kitchen with a glass of dark-red liquid and Donghyuck downed it in one go.

“Let’s see what we can do about this situation here.” Jaehyun was in front of Jeno now. “I’m really not sure my medical knowledge is any help here.” He pushed the knife up a little to see more. It tickled.

“I think we have to address this from a magical point of view.” Dejun sweetly chimed in, while Jaehyun still inspected the place where the blade poked from Jeno’s skin. 

“Are Zombies a thing?” Jeno asked. Dejun knew stuff about the supernatural, outside of the vampires and werewolves, that were common knowledge. 

“I mean, that’s not the professional term, but yes, Undead, Revenant, those exist in literature.”

“Wait, will you have to eat brains now?” Yangyang asked, sounding concerned. 

“Why are you worried? He can’t get anything from you.” Kunhang drily commented.

“Okay, listen here, smarty pants.”

“I wished we could ask Renjun, but he looks pretty out of it.” Taeil muttered.

“I think he used too much magic.” Ten supplied “He took out seven vampires and then revived Jeno, that must have been a strain.”

Jeno looked at where Jaemin was next to Renjun, whom he had played on the sofa, gently stroking their hair. The sparkling had almost worn off, but it left Renjun looking ethereal in his sleep. Jeno realised he could hear their heartbeat, despite sitting a few steps away. He’d have to figure out what that was about later.

“I think we’ll be fine without him, if there’s no bleeding now, there won’t be any internally or Jeno would have long bitten the dust.” Jaehyun analysed. 

“So?” Taeil asked.

“Someone hold him, and we’ll pull it out.” Jaehyun shrugged.

“Listen, I get you have sadistic tendencies, but please keep them to the bedroom. First Donghyuck, now Jeno, he’s really been through enough!” Dongyoung hissed and Jaehyun raised an amused eyebrow.

“Guys, it’s fine, the knife is sort of annoying, let’s do it.” Jeno chipped in. He did NOT need more information than absolutely strictly necessary on Jaehyun and Taeyong’s bedroom activities. What he had heard so far was already too much.

When Jaehyun yanked out the blade, Jeno didn’t even flinch. He had felt it, but as mildly unpleasant at best. Jeno wondered if he no longer could feel pain.

It was a little freaky, but it was also quite handy. 

“Fascinating.” Dejun whispered. The wound in his chest didn’t close, but there was no blood, other than the old, dried one from when he had died, or not died?, on his clothes. “I really have to read up on this. This is so exciting. I mean. I don’t see you as a lab experiment, Jeno, but… it’s an interest of mine, please don’t take it the wrong way.”

“That’s fine. Might actually help me figure stuff out.”

“So, you won’t die any second now?” Jaemin asked, his voice untypically soft. 

“No, don’t think so.” Jaehyun confirmed. 

With a sob, Jaemin threw himself into Jeno’s arms, who toppled over from the force and found himself pinned to the ground, Jaemin lying on him and crying into his shoulder. 

Jeno wrapped his arms around his boyfriend and held him, while the feeling of endless relief coursed through him.

Renjun would be fine, too. They had gotten through it. And now, it was over, and they’d get to live happily ever after.

 

It took 10 hours for Renjun to finally wake up. 

During these ten hours, Johnny and Ten fought in the living room over the importance of their relationship, and much to the relief of everyone made up, Jeno figured out that he couldn’t eat fruit anymore, Mark finally got a hold of Mina, Jeno realised that losing his ability to feel pain fortunately didn’t affect all sorts of touch, like Jaemin stroking his face, his arms, everywhere, Chenle dropped by and had everyone retell him EXACTLY what had happened, Jeno found out that all he could eat was raw meat, which was sort of gross, Mina came over and mildly freaked out over learning vampires existed, telling Mark she needed time to understand this, Jaemin finally reconnected with his parents, only by phone for now, but soon personally, and Jeno decided that he was going to call himself a Zombie, even if Dejun kept softly reminding him that didn’t sound very professional and Undead would be the correct term.

But then, finally, Renjun’s lashes fluttered, and they opened their eyes. 

“Injun. Hey.” He softly said and tapped Jaemin’s shoulder to wake him from his nap.

“Jeno?” Renjun’s voice was husky “What the hell, I… wait!” they jerked upright and their hands immediately went to Jeno’s chest. “Oh no.” they paled. Jeno grabbed the hands and held them. 

“What’s going on?” Jaemin grumbled and slowly rose, until he realised Renjun was awake. “Injunie!”

“Jeno, shit, I’m so sorry.”

“What for?”

“This, fuck, this isn’t even allowed, my mom’s going to chew my ear off.” Renjun whispered.

“We don’t have to tell her?” Jaemin suggested, looking like he didn’t even know what Renjun was talking about. It was cute.

Luckily, the silly remark seemed to be enough to break Renjun from their small freak-out and they started chuckling.

“Of course, you’d suggest that. For how long was I out, how do you feel? Shit, are you really okay?”

“I feel pretty good. The current number one topic of discussion is what to call this state. Is Zombie fine? Because me and Donghyuck think Zombie sounds awesome, but Dejun said it’d unprofessional.”

“Z-zombie?” Renjun blinked. “Yeah, sure, if you want to, you can decide what to call yourself, obviously.”

“Great. Oh, and will that stab heal? Because you can actually look through my chest if you try right now. Jaehyun’s slightly concerned.”

Renjun yelped “What? Oh my god, WHAT?”

“Don’t worry, it’s fine if it doesn’t, it doesn’t hurt or anything.”

“No, that’s no state, let me heal that!”

“Don’t you dare, you just fainted from exhaustion!” Jaemin grabbed Renjun’s hands.

“But…”

“I agree, you better rest!” Jeno insisted.

“Fine. But no, it won’t heal, as far as I know. And… well, this is awkward but just so you know: the magic I used is… well essentially it’s used to make puppets, or… slaves? I’ll be able to… control you. If I want. Like a form of bewitchment. Which is one of the reasons why it’s actually not allowed to resurrect people.”

“I appreciate you still doing it! I know you won’t do anything, just like Jaemin won’t. Being a puppet-Zombie is far better than dying.” Jeno smiled.

“Yeah, well, couldn’t bear being with Jaemin only, he gets way too annoying for only one person.” Renjun mumbled, a blush spreading on their cheeks. 

“Oh, you’re so cute when you pretend you’re not totally head over heels for me.” Jaemin squeaked and grabbed Renjun’s chin, angling their face up to kiss them.

Jeno didn’t have a heartbeat anymore, but he still felt warmth spread in his chest over seeing his two partners kiss.

“Shut up, I never said that.”

“It was implied.”

“I’m not going to stoop to Yangyang and Kunhang level with the permanent sexually charged bickering.”

“I wasn’t doing anything.”

 

Travelling from Hoegi to college every day was a little exhausting, but without a working student job, Jeno was very glad to save the rent money. Especially since raw meat billed up might higher than Ramen would. 

The shy blossoms of spring pushed through the earth, announcing the arrival of the warmer seasons.

“I can’t believe I still haven’t gotten a sugar daddy. This is not what I signed up for.” Jaemin sighed.

“I’m gagging, this is just gross.” Donghyuck muttered, not looking up from his phone. 

“I’m suffering, okay?”

“Nana, I told you to change your major to something that fits better.” Jeno softly tried.

“But I need to be close to you, in case you do some dumb shit again.”

“Appreciate it.”

“Guys, I’ll meet up with Mina after classes, she just texted me.”

“The weird thing here isn’t that I try and find a sugar daddy, but that you became friends with Mark’s ex.” Jaemin muttered.

“Shut up, she’s sweet, I won’t let you speak badly of her.”

“How the tables have turned.” Jeno softly added. He didn’t mind it, not at all. Mark and Mina hadn’t broken up on bad terms, however, Donghyuck was definitely better friends with her than Mark was. He wasn’t sure what the future for these two would be, but what he knew was that Donghyuck was still on page 1 of getting over Mark – meaning there were still these glances he shot him, that spoke of how he felt. 

The two of them sharing a room due to the house being on the edge of the capacity it held probably didn’t really help it. It wasn’t Jeno’s decision, though. Donghyuck was the one with the feelings. If he wasn’t going to actively work to get over them anymore, it was his decision. 

With time being frozen, some things just didn’t seem as important anymore, such as living your youth how society suggested, the pressure of some timeframe passing was lifted. 

If Donghyuck didn’t get over Mark now, he still could in five, ten, or twenty years, and find true love then – if he wanted to.

Mark, on the other hand, was busy getting over the heartbreak and figuring his life out. His parents had found out their son was a vampire, which probably had to do with his father being a former Hunter and very much aware of the signs. In the end, that made things easier for him, and for Donghyuck, who was still very welcome in the Lee house. 

Jaemin’s family didn’t know about their son’s changed nature, nor did they know about his two partners. But that was fine. Because Renjun’s parents knew. Jeno had not known that Renjun had two mothers, but it just made sense – and it also made everything a whole lot easier. 

They initially hadn’t been very happy with their child’s involvement with vampires, much less with their misuse of magic, but they had never been anything but sweet towards Jeno and Jaemin, since they weren’t the ones responsible for their child’s adventures and rule-breaks. And over Jaemin’s endless charms and Jeno being on his best behaviour, they had eventually come to accept it.

It felt like another home, next to Kun’s coven, that had opened up for Jeno. It only made being in love with Renjun so much sweeter.

“Oh my god, is that Renjun? In a skirt? What is he doing?” Donghyuck squinted and Jeno followed his line of view and nearly screamed. 

Because it was.

“Holy shit, over knee socks are the hottest thing anyone’s ever invented, what a blessed day this is.” Jaemin whispered in awe. 

“You’re not worried he’s wearing girls’ clothes?”

“I’m worried I have to knock your teeth in if you make more disrespectful comments.” Jeno hissed.

“Wait what?” Donghyuck backed away. 

“Down boy, Renjun hasn’t told him yet.” Jaemin pulled Jeno away by the collar. “You don’t find that troubling, right?” he smiled sweetly.

“No. No, I was worried because people might be pretty nasty! Shit, I became one of the nasty people.” Donghyuck gasped, hands raised in silent surrender. Jeno felt himself calm down over Donghyuck clearly realising his mistake. Jaemin was right. Renjun hadn’t told him yet, he had only started to very slowly tell a few people. 

Some reactions had been good, some reactions had been confused, some reactions had been a little awkward, but none had been bad yet, and it helped Renjun gather their courage for each new person they told.

“Well, that’s what we have Jeno for, he can go and knock in their teeth. It’ll be great!” Jaemin laughed. 

Jeno huffed. He didn’t have quite the strength Jaemin held, he also didn’t have magic, but he was better at martial arts than both of them, which cancelled their advantages to a degree, so he was proud to say that in the quest of who was going to protect their triple, he no longer was the one keeping quiet. 

“Right, can’t wait for the lawsuits, maybe Renjun will be your advocate.”

“Who am I supposed to be advocate for?” Renjun asked. Their hair was braided on one side, and a soft hue of eyeshadow dusted over their eyes, how Yuta had taught them to do. Their voice was higher today. It was so pretty, Jeno wished they weren’t on the open street and he could kiss them.

“Jeno, when he goes all protective and people will sue him for assault.” Jaemin grinned. 

Renjun glanced at Donghyuck. They were putting on a confident front, but Jeno saw the insecurity. 

“He threatened me. I might have deserved it, though, do you prefer she?” Donghyuck carefully asked.

“Some days. Today, I do.” Renjun’s posture became better and her smile more genuine. 

“Alright. Sorry if I was disrespectful in the past. I promise I won’t continue being a tactless asshole. Tell me if you need me to have an educationally valuable conversation with more bigots. I got a 87% in children’s psychology. I’m qualified! Though, I feel like most of our generation is starting to be more openminded and accepting.”

“Thank you, that’s… that’s really great to hear.” Renjun smiled, looking a little shy.

“Of course. I don’t run my LGBTQ+ Insta to stand around and be a useless bystander in real life. Oh, this is my turn, see you later, guys.”

 

Donghyuck was right. Most people didn’t care if you came in pink unicorn pyjamas, a suit, or a skirt. Those that gave confused, or even unpleasant glares, were easily ignored, as Jeno and Jaemin walked Renjun to her first class. Jeno kept having to drag Jaemin along when he kept falling back from staring at Renjun’s legs too much. 

“So, did you tell your mothers?” 

“Yeah, since today is a girl day I felt like it was good timing.”

“And?”

“Well, they were a bit surprised, but they took it well. My mama braided my hair.” Renjun’s fingers ghosted over the hairdo carefully.

“It’s really pretty.”

“Thank you. See you later, don’t get kidnapped.” Renjun broke away from their middle, as they reached her classroom. 

“We won’t.” Jaemin laughed and waved. 

It had become their tag line. To fight the bad memories lingering, they had turned it into a joke, something not to take seriously anymore.

Thinking of all the positive that had come from the whole mess helped. First of all, they had finally become the triple they had hoped to become for so long. Secondly, Jeno was now a welcome guest at a nightclub called EXO, because their bouncer Kyungsoo had apparently developed one of his rare soft spots for him. He was the wolf from the house. The whole club was run by wolves and kind of friends with Kun’s coven. And thirdly, Dongyoung had become the first vampire working for Department Four – uniform and all – soon followed by more. There had been some voices opposing it, some people dropping out because they were unwilling to work together with these monsters they had created in their heads, but for the most part, their work went smoothly.

Of course, the public didn’t know about their existence yet – and hopefully never would. But the Union had done a good job of keeping the secret for centuries, so that wasn’t a worry. 

“I have so many ideas what to give Renjun for her birthday!” Jaemin sighed, as they approached the science building.

“I’m guessing most of it is not safe to unwrap in front of others?”

“Maybe?” Jaemin grinned and Jeno shook his head. 

“I’m glad I no longer have to deal with all of your wild ideas alone.”

“I’m glad I now have even more people giving me ideas.”

Jeno laughed and shoved Jaemin a little. Unlike when Jaemin had felt like an unmovable rock to Jeno shortly after being turned, he now stumbled two steps before catching himself and pouted at Jeno.

Yes, the positive definitely out-weighted the negative, even when Jaemin was being his slightly obnoxious self again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading. 
> 
> I’ve come to the decision that this will be the last part of the NosferaCT series. I struggled a lot with keeping consistent characterisations since I wrote the first part of this nearly a year ago and so many different works in between, in which I characterised the members differently, or some of them have shown new and different sides I’d like to include but can’t in a fixed universe. 
> 
> It’s bittersweet saying goodbye to my first series, which was also my first work in the fandom, but I feel like Pixiedust suffered too much in terms of quality bc I was struggling so much with keeping it in this huge AU I created. So, it’s time to let it go and move on to new AUs. I’m sorry if I won’t be able to show stories you might have been interested in, but I hope I can bring you other interesting works in the future! Thank you for your support for this AU <3
> 
>  
> 
> [CuriousCat](https://curiouscat.me/Fox_155)  
> [Twitter](https://twitter.com/155Fox)


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